Change and Growth

By Megan Brewer, LMHC

          Change can be hard. “I hate change” seems to be a mantra for many as they face situations or seasons where what felt familiar is now foreign. Change can be hard because it requires us to adjust to something new and unfamiliar. That adjustment often feels very uncomfortable because it requires a lot of energy, even when it is a good change. If your life has held the heavy weight of chaos from past harm and wounding, change can be particularly disruptive. 

          Imagery can sometimes help us capture something of our experience that helps us make sense of what we feel and think. So, I will begin with a story that I hope will be helpful as we seek to navigate changes and transitions well. 

          I have always enjoyed plants and the ability to cultivate and help them grow. As I have moved through the process of raising plants, I regularly discover the ways they represent our journey as we experience and grow through challenges. I was recently reminded of one such experience when I put my first plant in the soil of our new home. After living in a location without a backyard for many years where I had to keep all my plants in pots, I was looking eagerly to putting them in the ground. I imagined they would take root and thrive instantly with the endless space and nutrients they would receive as they left behind the confines of the pot forever. I carefully choose a favorite Audrey Ficus shoot I had been growing for a year, knowing it was healthy and had mature roots. I carefully chose a spot with lots of light and space and dug a hole. As I dug, I realized the soil in my new backyard contained a lot of sand, which was different from the nutrient rich soil in the pot. I began to wonder how this plant would do in these conditions as they were so different from what was known all its life. In the days that followed, my little plant started to look less vibrant. Its lively shiny green leaves started to burn and turn white in the bright sunlight and the new growth coming in on the top paused. I didn’t know what would happen as the days went on, but continued faithfully to give it extra water most days and waited. As the weeks turned into months I wondered if anything would ever grow again from this little shoot. But one day I went out and saw new small leaves starting to sprout from the top of my little plant. Growth had begun again after the necessary time it took for the plant to adapt to its new home. 

          When we are in a space that is known and safe, we are given the opportunity to thrive. We grow deep roots and expand up and out as we take up more and more space in the world. But unpredictable seasons enter our lives. Sometimes they are our choice and other times they are not. Even good changes hold painful experiences as we adjust to a life that does not yet feel normal.

          Change is synonymous with stress. Stress appears anytime we experience something that requires us to use energy to adjust. Change always requires us to adjust, even when it is good. In transplanting my plant, I hoped for a better and more expansive place for it to grow. But I was unprepared for how that change would stress the plant and pause it’s growth temporarily until it adjusted. We experience something of this when the normal we have known is suddenly foreign. We move locations, we go to college or our children do, we lose someone we love, our job, our home, our ability to do what we love, we start over somewhere new, enter a new relationship or exit an old one, and through all the change we have the opportunity to rediscover how we want to show up in the world and in our relationships. 

          Change takes time, often more time than we want it to take. But time creates and can bring about growth, even if it doesn’t appear so in the moment. In the midst of adjustment, we need support equivalent to the stress we experience. Just as I spent more time tending to my newly replanted plant, we need extra attention and care from people who love us. We need more rest, more nutrients and more time to adapt without the requirement to show up in the same way we did when everything felt normal and known. Like the plant, we need permission to shift our energy and attention to the work of learning to live differently in the new place we find ourselves. This often means we can’t give the same energy to everything we use to until we feel more rooted. It requires us to become better stewards of our energy and capacity and to be more aware of what we need and what will truly help us thrive.

          When you look carefully at the current image of my plant, the story of its journey can be easily seen. As you look up the trunk, you can see the damage sustained to the leaves from the sudden direct sunlight and change of soil when it was replanted. But above those leaves shoots new vibrant green life, hard-won by many days of refocusing energy towards learning to thrive in a new unknown world. We all hold the capacity to grow and that capacity was always meant to be held in more hands than our own. If you are in a season of difficult change, allow the time and energy it takes to adjust, reach out for support and remember there is new growth yet to come. 

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