There is so much talk about change in today’s society. “We need to change”, circumstances change and as such change our lives. This is rightfully so. To define change we can say it is situational. You come to work and the company you work for has been sold. That is change. They will probably tell you nothing will change; of course it will, the first change has already taken place. You become a parent; it most definitely represents a change in your life. Change is sudden even though you might get a “warning”, like a nine-month pregnancy. The real change though, takes place when the child is born.

What are far more important in our lives are life transitions. We don’t have any tradition for this in the western culture. We have to look to what we would describe as primitive tribes to find rituals that represent life transitions. These tribes are not necessarily primitive; they are just different. They have rituals for various life stage transitions and a typical ritual for this is “from childhood to adulthood”.

The only transitional ritual of any importance we have left is probably when we pass away and the funeral associated with that. This is of course a good thing, but it is late.

Does this mean that in the western culture there are no transitions? No, not at all, but they are mostly unintentional and not directed at all. Many would benefit from daring to go actively into this kind of processes. That would also free us from some changes that “just happen”, at least that is how we perceive it. By directing it we take control of our lives, our development and will get a much richer life from it.

Can there anyway be transitional processes that we will influence us barely by being part of the society? Definitely.

Many would say that USA over the past three decades or so has gone through a transition, more than one probably, and some for the better and some for the worse. Some intentional and some unintentional.

President Barack Obama talked about change during his presidential campaign. You cannot change a country or a society just like that. The new president represented a change, it is situational, and he can implement some new parameters that in themselves are changes, and (hopefully) will lead to transitions.

We don’t need more change, we need…., that’s correct.

For more on transitions, visit: http://peteraursnes.com