Mind Moves: At this time of the year many of us are saying goodbye in one way or another. School is finally over for thousands of secondary school pupils, third-level courses are coming to an end for others, and many collaborative work ventures are drawing to an end.
Somewhere in the flurry of last-minute deadlines, there is a gnawing realisation that the relationships that have supported us through a critical time of our life may also be over. Outwardly, there is talk of progress and new beginnings but privately we may feel a sense of loss that is not easily articulated.
Humans both long for and fear change. In our make-up, we seek continuity and stability. Our identities become linked to specific people and projects and to familiar feelings and sensations that form the texture of our everyday lives. We grow accustomed to regular conversations with colleagues over coffee, to work meetings where ideas are exchanged and problems are resolved.
These routines become part of the landscape of our lives and they create a feeling of predictability and security. The bonds we form in the course of our work become an important part of what shapes our personal identity. We grow and are transformed by them and yet, like every other relationship we form in our lives, there comes a time to say goodbye.
Letting go is hard, and no one is absolved from the pain of loss. Yet it is inevitable if we are to move into new and different possibilities of personal development. It is easier when there is a clear vision of where we are moving on to, but change always carries uncertainty. There are no guarantees that the new ground we are moving to will support us.
Our future opens up before us as uncharted terrain. It invites us to move beyond our comfort zone to a new frontier where the only guarantee is that we will be surprised. We may take with us what we've learned and been given by others, but if we truly embrace change, our old identity will be broken and re-formed as we adapt to a new context.
Change requires the courage to let go old protocols for survival and discover afresh the full extent of our hidden resourcefulness.
As we are surrounded by boxes and treated to goodbye tributes by those who've been our allies and confidants, it is wise to take some time to attend to the inner drama that is unfolding.
Taking time for yourself, you may notice you are able to separate feelings of loss and regret, anxiety and excitement. Each of these feelings has its place.
Naming what is real for us has the advantage of making us feel more connected with ourselves and with others. Knowing how we feel helps us to take responsibility for how we act. Is there someone whose support we especially need to acknowledge? Is there some unfinished business that deserves closure so that moving on will be easier?
While dialogue and closure are ideals that make endings more bearable, it is important to recognise that life isn't always so neat. Some people go quietly, but others refuse "to go gently into the night".
Anger at whatever or whomever they are leaving behind seems to be the only way for some to say goodbye. When our TV Friends said their goodbyes, they closed their apartment door gently behind them. In contrast, many of us slam the door as we leave, because the pain of letting go and moving on is so painful.
An angry goodbye does not necessarily mean "good riddance". It can be just another way of coping with the hurt of parting and taking what feels like a fearful step into an unknown future.
At a recent seminar in Dublin, the poet David Whyte said life was about constantly making a home for ourselves and having to leave it just as we do.
Life seems to be always asking of us that we inhabit it in a new way. It invites us to leave those places of comfort, where we all too easily can hide, and hazard ourselves in the face of some new challenge, some unforeseen complication.
To protect ourselves from change, we may choose to hold each other in some safe place where change is shunned as far as possible. And yet, he said, our soul longs to belong to the world in the largest way it can. If allowed, it will sacrifice an identity that has been forged assiduously for years, to experience a true sense of belonging in the only way it can. This sense of belonging, this experience of home, is achieved when we enter wholeheartedly into whatever life is asking of us at this particular time, with an openness to being radically changed by that encounter.
• Dr Tony Bates is principal psychologist at St James's Hospital, Dublin, and author of Depression: a common sense approach (Newleaf).
