for more about this time.)

I had moved through a series of stages in the process of translating this urging. The first approximation had been a well-explored vision of relocating to the rural seaside at the tip of Long Island. That version included moving with my partner of seven years and building a practice as a therapist in this new area. Over the course of almost six months, the plan kept shifting and redefining itself.

After a whle, it became clear that I needed to let go of my profession – the idea of building another practice felt wrong, even suffocating. Sometime further along, the idea of staying on the East Coast – even at the very rural edge of it – felt not right. And, as the vision slowly reconfigured into a road trip to California, the notion of going on this journey with a partner in tow felt stifling and wrong.

Gradually I understood that what I needed was to take my leave from everything: my partner, my profession, my friends, my family, my possessions and my East Coast roots. Some of the leave-taking felt like it might be permanent. Some of it felt like it would be only for some as yet unknowable period of time.

The plan became one of going forth on this open-ended trip like a turtle – with my house on my back as it were. Here, too, the translation kept refining. First I looked at mini-motor homes, then van-conversions. Finally, I knew that I needed to buy a simple, empty commercial van and set it up myself as a bed-sitting room, creating my new living space using salvage gleaned from the life I was leaving.

Having the van as a mobile, self-contained base provided some very primal assurance. I would always have my home with me; a home that would provide the safety of a familiar, comforting womb for my rebirthing process, a base camp out of which I might venture as my journey unfolded. This felt essential to the process of moving into the unknown and unknowable.

It was an outrageous shift for the ambitious super-achiever I had been until then. Yet, the times allowed for and even encouraged the possibility of such radical dropping out. In the so-called real world, many different kinds of people were engaged in intense questioning, in re-examining their lives, values and directions. In those still-hippie days, lots of folks were going on the road, moving out of formerly conventional trajectories.

Attentive to the inner voice that was speaking to me so insistently, I followed wherever it led. Baby-step by baby-step, things fell into place. I was completing my life as it had been. I felt surprisingly comfortable, without trepidation or fear as I approached the final leave-taking; amazingly unfazed by not knowing what was in store for me after I would leave.

As I moved through the stages and phases of preparing to leave, I was learning a powerful lesson about navigating the seas of radical, rapidly moving change. My focus was narowed to only very thin slices of now, doing and processing just one tiny step at a time; no thinking about what was next, what might be waiting even further on down the path or where I might in fact be heading. The how of it all revealed itself to me in small, timely glimpses as I proceeded.

Carried by the energy moving me through the process, I was building the confidence, clarity and emotional capacities I needed for this major transition. Each step changed me and by doing that, prepared me for the next step. I was taught not to scare myself by looking beyond just where I found myself in the moment. When I reached places that might have scared the who I had been just days ago, the who I’d become by the moment that had just arrived was not at all frightened.

Through the more than thirty-five years since that time in my life, I’ve held onto that extraordinary lesson. Whenever I find myself moving through periods of highly accelerated change or shift, the knowing place inside me always reminds me to focus on the thinnest slices of now that I can define.

Slowing things way down is usually the best first approach to any intensity that threatens to unsettle one’s balance. When that doesn’t work, the practice of slicing now very thinly is the next best bet.

Focusing on the thinnest slice of now we can define keeps us from swamping ourselves with anticipations of what we’re not yet ready/equipped to handle. This narrowing of our focus also helps us to not overwhelm ourselves trying to encompass the sheer volume of the changes careening toward us. It's a practice that also works to calm us when we ’re feeling inundated by too many projects, too many tasks or too much obsessive worrying.

Whenever you feel overwhelmed and unable to slow the process of change to a more manageable pace, consider living in the thinnest slice of now that you can define,

P.S. So many of your delicious e-mails send appreciations for the affirmation, support and nourishment you receive from the site. When I answer them, I don’t always remember to let you know that having your own deck of the Rememberings and Celebrations cards is a way to bring this same loving voice into your everyday world, to have it at hand as you need to remind yourself of the "real" truth moment to moment in the crazimakingness of the so-called real world!

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The card on this page is part of a set of 64 bookmark-size cards called the Rememberings and Celebrations deck. They can be used as an oracle, a meditation focus or a "book-in-pieces" to kindle and grow a compassionate, gentle, unconditionally loving, fiercely protective inner-Mother to help you carve safe healing space for your emerging self and for the wounded little ones inside.

If you'd like a deck of your very own to support you in your journey, click here to download Order Form.

Please feel free to e-mail me at rposin@hotmail.com. to share your reflections and responses to any or all of what you find here . I'd really like to hear what touches and nourishes you!