Transformation Pt 1 - The Transform Stage

I received a big response to the last Success Secrets Ezine - Some Days, Life Just Sucks (Handling Transformation), - I guess many of us are going through the process - So I figured, it may be of value to dig deeper into the transformation process, because it's extraordinary, relevant and compelling.

Transformation: TRANSFORM - Transition - Embody

The transformation process itself is made up of 3 stages, or sub-processes, each with it's own unique characteristics, needs and techniques, for handling them. It makes managing the process much more challenging when we mix methodologies.

The 3 stages are

• Transform 
• Transition 
• Embody 

So, let's look at the TRANSFORM stage

Transformation is not change, and it's a disaster getting the two all mixed up.

Change occurs all the time, and in order to stay current we need to constantly be responding to the change that's happening around us. But, at some point, a bigger, more fundamental change is required.

Transformation is a profound shift, in what we take, to be the truth - Which of course radically alters our inner psychological landscape, shakes things up, and more often than not, results in pronounced lifestyle, relationship and/or business changes.

• Change is a new president or government - Transformation is a new socio-economic mode of production. 
• Change is a new boyfriend - Transformation is a new sexual orientation. 
• A small change is moving from the Anglican to Presbyterian church down the road, a big one, converting from Christianity to Islam. But transformation would be like a deeply religious person, becoming an agnostic or atheist (or visa versa). 

Transformation occurs when there is just no space left, for change, within a current paradigm (truth), and the whole paradigm needs to be replaced with a bigger, more embracing one.

It's a bit like taking your pet goldfish, that's outgrown it's bowl, and putting it into a pond - Except, that the pond in this case, is purely mental or psychological, and has nothing to do with any physical reality.

The physical reality changes later, during the transition process.

A good example of this, would be Newtonian physics at the end of the 19th century. It was stuck, and there was no real space for it to go any further. Along came Einstein, Heisenberg, Bohr and Quantum, and together they changed the way we both understand, and understand the workings of our universe.

The transformation process includes

• Questioning - which we usually only get around to doing, when we're feeling stuck or trapped (painful) 
• Studying, learning and contemplating (time and energy consuming) 
• Letting in new ways of understanding, seeing and thinking (confusing but liberating) 
• Dissolving old ways of understanding, seeing and thinking (painful) 
• Trusting your intuition (scary) 
• A series of awakenings, or ahaa's (liberating and exciting) 

The trick with the transform stage is ...

• to transcend the temptation to shut it down to quickly. In other words don't presume that the fist ahaa, is the only ahaa. Let it run its course, and stay with the question(ing). You'll know when it's done, because you'll feel a profound sense of completion. 

• to transcend the temptation to act from within the energy of the ahaa, itself. Whenever we have an ahaa moment, there is always a powerful release of energy. It feels good, and the temptation is to immediately charge off, and change the world. 

But it's not done yet, and if you move to quickly, there is no inner mindset transformation - After some time you'll forget the ahaa, wonder what got you so excited, and things will settle, more or less, to the way they where - which is depressing. Or, you'll end up getting terribly lost - which is very painful.

It's important to stay with the transform stage, until it's complete, and in some extreme cases this has taken years. If you don't do this, the transform stage never really takes hold, and you'll end up being left in limbo - and that's a real cruddy place to be.


The TRANSFORM stage, challenge

It's almost impossible to work out a new way of understanding, seeing and thinking by yourself, because it's you current way of understanding, seeing the world, and thinking, that's managing the process, and IS the problem.

It's infinitely faster and less painful to get a mentor, and this is exactly what I do. I guide my clients through the process of transformation - Transform, Transition and Embody.

So, if you're stuck, contact me, and let's get you unstuck.

More in the next posts

Since I don't want to make the post more complicated than it already is, I'm going to break this topic up into several posts - not sure, right now, how many that will be.