Transitions Are Dead To Me.
“Transition” just doesn’t hit like it used to. Which is to say, transitions are maybe even more dizzying than they were when I was growing up.
I’ll never forget the day, in high school “advisory”, when our guidance counselor told our group this life-altering fact:
She said something like ‘previous generations changed jobs 2–3 times over their lives, your generation? You’re projected to change CAREERS about 7 times.” That’s not where you live, your place of employment, or sector….seven. different. careers.
It wasn’t really until I had arrived at my senior year of college that this truth really set in. There I was, about to get a degree in biomedical engineering and…enter the classroom as a middle school science teacher instead of engineering my way through the world. This choice felt in deep alignment with the vision I had for my life at the time, much to my mom’s dismay.
She actually sent me “dreams deferred”, then wrote the words “dream deferred” on a big ass envelope. To escalate the dramatics in true caribbean fashion, she then wrote “PhD in Biomedical Engineering” on a piece of paper, tucked it into the envelope, sealed it, and vowed to keep it until I accomplished her dream for me — at which point she would destroy it.
[And yall wonder why I’m dramatic.]
Anyways, she clearly hadn’t gotten the same talk from my guidance counselor. Transition was endemic to my generation.
Another way to describe this is that uncertainty and instability are things we know all too well — and thus we have no choice but to transition.
The other day in the shower I was punishing myself for being so focused on transition. I was, admittedly, plotting on my next move and what my life would look like in my next living situation — whether moving was even realistic in this economy. Could I even really assume life would be better if I *did* successfully move? I was both dreaming and worrying.
I realized in that moment that I am *always* thinking about whats next, or what’s coming. I never really quite feel settled where I am, or at the job I’m at, or with whom I love if I’m being honest. And sometimes, it’s one of my greatest challenges to my mental health I fear. I place a lot of blame on myself for this dissatisfaction — this…discontent. Am I truly trying to optimize my life or am I just intent on being unhappy? ungrateful? WHY does life need to be “optimized”? I never quite left the engineering thing behind.
We get plenty platitudes about living in the present, embracing the moment. “Living in the future is the definition of anxiety” or some shit like that. I think these axioms are true, generally. I mean, even if they’re not I *believe* them. I never feel better than when I’m lost in a moment, unless it’s a moment of loss, I guess.
Either way, in my heart I do aspire to be in more control of my presence, and I blame myself for the times I’m not. If you read my writing you’ll be able to tell just how much blame I present to myself as if it is a gift — as if it will help me heal — if only it could.
So, I’ve started to consider other factors when I recognize myself to be in a blame and shame spiral, and there I was with water in my eyes thinking about *why* I am always in transition, spiritually. And guess what I found?
I found a memory of my guidance counselor. I found the economy. I found the housing market. I found breakups that brought me peace. I found the cost of living and price gouging. I found the fact that I live hundreds of miles away from anyone that’s known me more than 5 years. I found the reality of my life — realities that demand transition for survival. I found incessant historic events in my lifetime — in the last decade — in the last year.
The earth is constantly shifting underneath us and I keep wondering why I can’t keep my feet in place.
I am anticipating transition not because I am wanting to bring it about but because I have grown to realize that transition is a fact of my life. No — I can’t assume I’ll be at this job any longer than 2 years. No — I can’t assume I’ll live in the same place any longer than 2 years. No — I can’t even assume I’ll be able to afford this city 2 years from now.
Of course, things change — this is the one constant in life. But as my guidance counselor explained, our generation would be tasked with adapting to more change, different change, than those before us. Beyond embracing change in general we had to embrace a constantly changing life. Do you know what it means to live unsettled?
Some of us do better than others. But one thing I know to be true, because of that clarifying shower, is that those of us for whom settling is nothing but a dream deferred, transition is a constant. For those of us that struggle with change, for whatever reason, where does that leave us?
I realized even calling these life changes “transitions” means little to me now. Why am I talking about “moving” as a transition when I’ve moved every summer for the last six summers? It would seem *not* moving would be more of a transition.
I just left the #1 Biomedical Engineering PhD program in the country a few months ago, without a PhD, after five years of being in the program, and twelve years of plotting and scheming on this goal. I had to choose my survival over a chance at that degree. Maybe, then, it’s no surprise that I’m sitting here writing this many words about my relationship to transition.
I guess I say all of this to ask: for a generation that has been given nothing but uncertainty and instability, what is the *value* of transition? What does transition mean for us? For those of us that saw the before and after of the internet…what has come of our relationship to *change*? Maybe there’s a difference between approaching a few transitions throughout a lifetime and living in transition.
All of the time, we are taught to anticipate and plan for transitions. We are taught to brace ourselves for them. I realized during this shower (it wasn’t that long I swear) that when the transitions are endless, the only preparation for them is changing your mindset about them. Literally, how can you prepare for what doesn’t have a clear beginning or end?
Instead of suffering until transition, maybe I plan to find happiness *before* the transition I’m expecting. Potentially, rather than living in one place, I could place stock in my ability to sustain connections across space and time.
These days, transition *can’t* mean what it used to mean to me — I’ll be left woozy, whiplashed if it does. I’ll be just as burnt out as I am today. If transition is a fact of my life I’ll need to reorient to consistency, to expectation itself. For so long, I had been grasping at certainty, telling myself the bootstraps logic of “you just need to figure out how to stop transitioning.” I think I was trying to escape transition so I could also escape the loss that comes with it — the grief of it all. But, in the same way that capitalist “bootstraps” thinking never quite made sense, it actually can’t apply to what we’re living through.
An individual cannot, in and of themselves, prepare for a life-altering pandemic, for Cop City & political repression, for unprecedented price gouging, for supply shortages, for collective abandonment — only communities can do that. The individualistic, ableist leanings inherent to bootstraps logic forces us to divorce ourselves from reality in order to punish ourselves. I won’t do it any longer.
If imma develop delusions, they will serve me and not capitalist interests. Thus, transitions are dead to me. The dream and dread leading up to transitions are over with. My life is changing, *I* might try to focus on the ways these changes reflect a consistency I’ve committed to. If I do move, let’s talk about how I always choose really cool places to build community! If I leave a job, let’s talk about how I tend to really trade up! On a more serious note, maybe confronting and making space for feelings of loss and grief that tend to accompany these changes will help me feel more balanced about future changes. I’ll let y’all know how that goes, maybe.
About the Author
Julian Rose is a community organizer, educator, and writer originally from Hartford, CT, and currently based in Atlanta, GA. His work focuses on Black Queer Feminism, abolition, and solidarity economy movement building. Julian’s political home is Endstate ATL. Other Atlanta organizing efforts he has been involved in include the Free Atlanta Abolition Movement, a Black-run bail formation, and Barred Business’ Protected Campaign.
Acknowledgements
I have to thank my partner, Britni Ruff, for helping me refine these ideas — both after I leave the shower with a revelation and as I try to place the revelation on the page. Forever indebted.
