The Problem:

When you are focused toward the future and new beginnings, you’re often compelled to also note what is ending or, perhaps, what you feel ought to end. Feelings of grief, or gratitude, usually accompany this often unnerving assessment of where you’ve been and where you’re going.

If you find yourself focusing too much on beginnings, it can be difficult to learn from what is ending. Likewise, if you find yourself focusing on what is ending to the exclusion of seeing what is also beginning, you may lose contact with the motivation and vision essential to pulling your dreams into reality.

Plant Emerging from GroundPeople usually forget that beginnings always rest inside an ending. And, of course, that endings always rest inside beginnings.

When you jump into a beginning—whether you call it starting, launching, opening, creating, commencing, initiating, taking action, instigating, introducing, or establishing something new—you are setting out to weave into the fabric of your life a new pattern of thinking, doing, having, or Being.

This can result in forgetting about what is ending and just moving on to create something new, usually with the hope that it will never end. The equally common error is losing belief in another beginning and sinking into the ending as if it actually were the end of your story!

Paradoxically, when it is time to face an ending—whether you approach it as a finishing, conclusion, closing, a halting, termination, forced giving up, completion, or voluntary letting go—there is a human need to grieve this ending, perceiving it with a more dramatic eye as a finale or a final act.

If you neglect this natural need to grieve what is done, the beginning that wants to arise out of its ashes may be slowed, or actually unable to emerge. Neglecting to grieve has squashed untold new beginnings  before they’ve begun to sprout. And more endings have been stunted in their completion by losing access to the joy of the next beginning, the fruit of the ending’s labor.

The Remedy:

To move beyond this, practice taking at least 10 conscious steps a day. Be present to the beginning of each step AND to its end. Where is the line between the two? Can you discover where the beginning ends and the ending begins? And where does the presence of the next step begin to emerge? Where do you feel it in your body? Are the beginning of the next step and the ending of the last step simultaneously unfolding? Take a look and investigate for yourself. This kind of personal inquiry can change the feel, look, and sound of your entire day!

Together, beginnings and endings create the wholeness of the life cycle. Things end and begin every day. You have infinite opportunities to ride these wave of beginnings and endings. You can then be conscious of this rhythm and its feel—and stop choosing one as being better than the other.

Beginnings and endings is a fundamental polarity in the patterning of impermanence and uncertainty. Embracing it will give you the ground to stay balanced in the flow of change from this to that, from start to finish, and from endings to new beginnings.

Enjoy your exploration!
Much love,