Graduation

Friends,

In this amazing journey through the passages of life it is important to take the time to assess where we have been, where we hope to go, and where and when it is appropriate to celebrate a transition. Our lives are often in the process of challenging transitions, especially these past several as we adapted to Covid. Transitions are often wrenching with difficult decision about how to balance out what is lost and what is gained when we leave one position for another. But life has a way of shuttling us along in any case, and one of the most important tasks in life is learning to manage these transitions with grace and often courage.

One of the more emotional and tender of these transitions in life is the ritual of our graduation ceremonies when we come to realize that a particular era of our lives is ending, and we ponder all the memories associated with it, even as we begin imagining this new era  ahead in our lives . This applies to not only the graduates themselves, but to all of us who have accompanied, mentored, comforted and encouraged our loved ones and friends through a formative time in their lives. 

Although I was not able to attend in person my oldest granddaughter’s high school graduation this week, I was able to watch the whole ceremony via a streaming access. As she appeared briefly on the screen, there she was, now very much a young adult, passing through another life gate and a new life phase opening up before her. I found myself tearing up even before the Pomp and Circumstance anthem ushered her out. I could suddenly remember years of holding her as a tiny baby, then playing with her as a small child and into adolescence, then Zooming regularly with her through high school during the Covid shutdown. I realized I, too, was “graduating” from just being a grandfather into full blown eldering as a whole new generation is now launched into this very tumultuous world. An important part the ceremony for me, then, was the emergence into a spirit of hopefulness and promise that all these young people represent. When the choir sang  “The Impossible Dream” I cheered the new grads on as they, too, now must follow their dreams into the next era of their lives.

Sarah was one of an incredible 900 graduates of a very large suburban school in Virginia. In contrast my fourteen year old grandson graduated from eighth grade in a very tiny class of 15 from the Friends School in Portland, Maine. Although I was not able to be part of the event, I was especially aware of what this graduation transition meant to him. He began attending as a small child in the day care section during the initial years of the startup school where my son was one of the founding faculty fourteen years ago. So his graduation was also emotional inasmuch as the school was so central to his whole life thus far. It indeed is a big graduation for him. He now must move on from such a protected environment to face high school and cope with a whole new set of expectations and adaptations. 

Others of us are also experiencing important “graduations" and changes in our lives during this transition season: promotions, marriages, divorces, moves, and deaths, for example. Where we indeed have a choice about the direction of our transitions we will do so in a spirit of choosing life-giving alternatives that we hope will help us to be truly present and alive as we become the person we are meant to be. 

 I recently had the privilege of an extended two week vacation during which I spent a significant amount to time journaling and making notes for a memoir. Although I am now reflecting on a relatively long life, I have also had the privilege over the years to take similar amounts of reserved time to ask myself how I’m doing in life, what needs to change, what needs to be encouraged and expanded, for example, as I graduated from one era of my life into the next. I now realize how important those reflective, set-aside times were in my life - sometimes just a quiet morning, sometimes a few days of retreat, sometimes a walk in the woods. And I strongly recommend everyone find that kind of time in reflective assessment in their lives no matter what their age.

What are you currently preparing to graduate from and to? What are your expectation for the next stage of your life? And how will you know when to celebrate your own “graduation?”

Peace,
Tom