Change isn’t a straight line. It’s not a five-step plan (yes I know, the irony!) or a project timeline, or falls in sequence. It’s a lived, human experience and like all things human, it’s messy, non-linear, and often full of contradictions.

There are five zones that we move through in times of change: pausing, messy emotions, playing, trying, and restarting.

This comes with a ‘warning’ or ‘watch out’ - each of these zones carries its own kind of resistance. Not because we’re doing change wrong (because sometimes that’s how it feels), but because we’ve been taught, in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, to mistrust, or question, the very things that help us move through it.

You're too busy to stop and think, but that's the problem.

I’m playing with the idea we get caught in the busyness loop, and it just spins and spins, and wears us out but we cant stop because the loop is keeping us looping. If we stop the loop, then who are we? everything will fall? everything will fail? Or will it?

"How are you?"

"Busy."

We say it so automatically we barely notice it. Busy is the default answer, the social shorthand, the badge we wear to signal that we are useful, needed, in demand, earned our place on this planet.

Except. Does it?

Change has a peculiar way of keeping us busy. We rush to fix, fill, and figure things out, often without stopping to ask ourselves the most important question: what do I actually need right now?

This is where the Strategic Pause comes in. Not a pause as in doing nothing (though that's sometimes exactly right), but a deliberate, intentional moment of checking in with yourself. Once you know about the Strategic Pause (and the six energy elements) it will help you through all kinds of life’s moments.

Each pause serves a different purpose and works for you in a different way. Play with what works for you, when you need it, how you need it. We all pause in different ways, in different moments. It’s about knowing that ‘pausing’ is an important part of navigating change well.

What kind of pause do you need today?

“When you get tired, learn to rest, don’t quit” Banksy