First, I apologize for the silence. It has been a series of Eons moments in my life.

It has been all about change here and I found myself so busy doing tasks related to the changes- getting 3 of 4 daughters ready and off to college and law school- that I was avoiding the changing-accepting the reality of the emptying nest.

Left Brain Moments:
Behavioral scientists (i.e., psychologists, etc.) distinguish between changes and changing. Changes are the external and internal shifts to which we must adapt- or stay frozen-in-time and lost at the starting line as that abandoned bride, Miss Haversham, did in Great Expectations. Changing is the active process of adapting your self in response to those changes.

But change is strange and difficult even for those of us who have studied it and coached others through it. Brain science has confirmed that adapting to change is naturally strange- it may be downright unnatural. We have survived as a species by fighting tooth-and-nail against changes- things, people, ideas that are different- or by seeking safe harbor from such changes by hiding under piles of rocks in old days and under piles of work today. Our species has survived by resisting changing…

Changing is the internal work we can do to face our life change challenges head on. And, while resisting and fleeing change might have ensured our survival in yesteryear, in today’s world, changing is critical to surviving and thriving, to letting go of what was lost in a change, to looking forward to create visions of what is to be gained, and to moving forward to reach out to claim all that is wondrous and new in your changed life. Still, it isn’t easy.

Each one of us has characteristic ways of dealing with change, with the losses that are inherent in any change, and with generating visions to keep us moving forward. Some of our habitual patterns are healthy- and others are not. Notice I say ‘our’ here… Given that this has been the time in my life when I have been slammed with more significant changes than ever- all of them Eons-age phenomena- I thought I would let you in on how a change expert deals- or not- with change and changing…

The changes going down here this summer have been Eon-ite in proportion and gravity.
• From Memorial Day to 7.2.7 at 7:27 PM, I nursed my Dad through his last five weeks. It was a lot of doing- leaving room for a lot of denial as well as sadness. When he was not in deep sleep, we spent time laughing and watching Red Sox games (sorry to any NYC Yanks fans out there-read on to see that your city is my favorite on earth…), making his last weeks as much fun as he had made my life. Heck, we even got to the point that the pizza delivery person brought our order bedside and the nurses rallied around when we summoned them during moments of heat in the Sox games. Still there was enormous sadness especially for the two people who accompanied me during the critical moments of that trek- my baby brother (not yet Eons material) and my second daughter. I am still bereft though moving on.

• Then there was the preparation for and leave-taking of 3 of my 4 daughters. Like I said at the start, I spent more time avoiding the changing than doing it.

• And there was the minor change of getting rid of a much-beloved car- “Black Beauty” was her name. Getting rid of cars is more difficult for those of us who attach memories to them- heck, getting rid of anything including much-loved and memory-heavy tee shirts emblazoned with your favorite rock band and with washing-machine-eaten holes can be emotionally wrenching.

I once asked my car dealer, through tears streaming down my face as I got rid of an old car with floorboards so eaten away that you could see the street under your feet- “Do other people weep when they say goodbye to their old cars?” He assured me that he had seen grown men hurl themselves on top of their soon-to-be-turned-in-automobiles, almost impaling themselves on the hood ornaments just for that one last embrace and kiss.

While saying goodbye to cars has usually been difficult for me, I was in such fast-paced denial mode about the girls leaving that I neglected to even say goodbye to my much-loved ‘Black Beauty’ as I sped away in my six-speed stick new-to-me but previously-owned and yet-to-be-named automobile, the first one ever that is not black or navy but is BRIGHT RED. Talk about change- a week later, I still look for a black car when I go out to the parking lot and am jolted when I find a bright red buggy in my own driveway!…

Okay, so I know this left-brain stuff; I write about it; I speak about it; I am proud of changing the lives of many people who were facing down life-threatening illnesses that took them out of work and family life for a period of time while they got strong and healed and with others who were blindsided by life-altering injuries that took them out of Olympic-hopeful fields and put them into bedridden states.

So how does a person who coaches others to design and implement strategic life changes deal with change? I learned that the more things change, the more they remain the same- at least when it comes to our characteristic ways of dealing with changes and changing. And for me, when change is in the air, so are the aromas of Mister- or should I reframe that with Ms?- Clean and any other cleaning product I can lay my hands on…

Left brain moment: Changing has stages- a lot of what behavioral scientists and medical practitioners know about changing is based on the process that we humans go through when we must face and accept the loss of change when a loved one dies or when we must face our own demise.

Cliff Note version of the models: we go through stages of denial, anger, depression, and then acceptance of our loss where, finally, we acknowledge and internalize the death of what is lost and enter the stage of beginning anew and feeling renewed.

Denial- Faced with change, our first human nature response is to want to NOT face it- first we deny and avoid. We bury our heads under sand ostrich-style. For me, that was easy.

I had so much work to catch up on from the five weeks that I had spent bedside during my Dad’s passing-on process; and I had been so brave in facing that down with him side-by-side to the last moment when I held him as he passed to his next life- that I was ready for huge denial. My brain and heart were simply numb- I was just too tired to face more changes.

So denial and off to work it was- and for me that means the derobing and rerobing in endless airport security lines, being ferried to client sites by winged vehicles, and staying in hotels where I did not have to see my Daughters emptying their parts of the nest and packing their bags. Denial was easy- I had that down- I vacated the nest thinking I would not notice how empty it would be when they vacated.

FYI- It did not work…

Anger-Then there is the anger- we fight against change tooth and nail- we hurl barbed words at no one in particular, at whomever we believe is to blame, or at poor unsuspecting and often innocent fellow commuters who can not drive fast enough or can not maneuver their vehicles at the level of excellence that we claim to hold ourselves.

Did I go there? Of course- it’s human, it’s natural, and, good thing, it’s a step along the way to accepting the changes and moving on.

My anger was pretty short-lived- remember we each have a characteristic pattern and my own is to spend more time in the next phase as the anger hasn’t gotten me very far in my life shifts.

My anger came in bouts related to unrealistic expectations- why couldn’t one store that carried linens and things have all the linen-like things that we needed so we wouldn’t have to make yet another ‘targeted’ shop stop? Or why couldn’t all 4 of my daughters coordinate a night for family goodbye dinner when I would be home from my denial-ridden business treks?

Okay, I admit to some displaced anger too- I was probably a bit more critical of other drivers as well- wondering aloud why they allowed certain people on the roadways during times when back-to-school shopping traffic was at its height? But remember- this anger is a good sign as it is the forerunner to the next critical phase for moving on.

Depression- The sadness of depression- that was huge. Once it dawned on me that each of my daughters would move her things that represented her living under my roof out the door- well, what’s not to be sad about?
• I wept at night in the comfort of my own bed and bundled some major tears in there for the loss of my Dad.

• I wept in my driveway with utter abandon when my second headed off in her little car packed to the brim with those things, including major athletic gear, that would stead her through her senior year knowing that she would, most likely, never live at home again (excuse me while I get a tissue- did I say already that these phases of change are not linear and that we can revisit any one of them for a while until we have fully accepted the new deal, the new reality?)

• I wept when my oldest zoomed off into the sunrise with her rusted Subaru wagon packed full of belongings to outfit her new city apartment where she would study law books and legal briefings and party with a new set of friends and colleagues as well as her college buddies who had also landed in the best city on the East Coast (okay, personal view there and it’s the best despite their being home to the rivals of my much-loved Red Sox…).
• I became teary-eyed again when she returned to leave her car in my driveway. And when I drove her to the train for her trek to her new life, I sobbed like a baby, and I wept aloud as I deposited my first baby at the train station.

• But it wasn’t over yet. Leaving my third daughter at college seemed larger than life again because with her chosen profession, there is little chance that she will return to live at this nest. She, a talented and aspiring actress studying performing arts at one of the top schools, is London- and Hollywood-bound. Emptying my car of her belongings and moving her into her new room, meeting her new roommate and sharing lunch with her roommates’ parents- these were all acts that made her departure real. My new red car saw some waterworks on the way back home- to a newly-emptied and very quiet nest.

Acceptance-So how does a change coach work through the depression and move on to acceptance? I did a walk through. Just like when you walk through an apartment or house that you want to rent or purchase, each time after I had waved goodbye or deposited a daughter at her destination, I returned to my home and did the walk through of that daughter’s bedroom. It was painful to see the emptiness, it was sad to smell that unique aroma that each child has from the moment they hit air and are placed in your arms and to know that that aroma would dissipate with each day gone by. And I wept and wept and wept. And when I walked out of each of those bedrooms, I was cried out and ready for the next phase of acceptance and a new aroma- that of Mr. Clean…

More Acceptance- When I was a younger woman, in graduate school, I shared an apartment with 3 friends in med school, who LOVED it whenever I had an argument with my then-boyfriend. They could tell as soon as they stepped foot into out apartment- the aroma of Mr. Clean and bleach was in the air; the apartment sparkled from top to bottom. Unable to concentrate enough to write or read, I would scour and clean aerobically, powered by the tunes of Bruce as in Springsteen who, back then, wasn’t even such a big deal- and Eric Clapton who was playing with the likes of Cream-you Eons music lovers will get that reference!

Lucky for me, with all of the changes that have gone down this summer, there was a backlog of cleaning- a multitude of employment opportunities for Mr. Clean and his new peers of swift dusters.

Lucky too that music is so portable that I can plug myself in to listen to versions of Bruce, Clapton, and music my daughters have turned me on to.

My daughters had helped me to work into acceptance by leaving reams of laundry for some unnamed person to do - items that they did not need at school but did not want to trash- that occupied my hands and mind and reminded me of days when all 4 were under 7 and I engaged in endless hours of KarateKid-like ‘wax on wax off’ laundering.

Just as I was beginning to shed tears in my laundry room, a new phase of kicked in-humor. I started to laugh aloud as I recalled how, when the girls were little, I had carefully labeled each piece of clothing that they wore with a first initial so I could figure out where it belonged.
I smiled as I recalled that by the time daughter number four got some of her hand-me-downs, they had all four initials on them.

Recalling great memories is a powerful strategy for working through loss and for setting your mind to crafting new visions that can become tomorrow’s memories.

And I laughed remembering when my oldest asked why other kids at school didn’t have their initials emblazoned on their socks- I assured her that should she ever forget her name, she could solve her identity crisis by consulting her sock. A serious youngster (no surprise that she is a biomedical engineer in law school), she took it as law. Perhaps I will use that strategy of labeling my own socks later in life should I begin to forget my identity...

Death and New Beginnings- Then, with laughter which requires breathing, the internal turmoil calmed down as I faced the reality of the changes that I had maneuvered over the past two months, and I realized that it was time to take a bigger dose of my own medicine.

Just as I was about to embark on this blog, I visited my Eons mailbox and picked up my messages that inspired me. Well, actually it was the life stories of the people who befriended me and signed up for this blog (I delight in reading the life stories and passions of those who have written or befriended me. I also listen to the tunes some of you add- please- tell me how to add music.)

Your words jumpstarted the connection between brain and fingers required to write- you awakened me from my own changes!
Your messages and life stories helped me to realize that I had not been taking my own medicine in adequate doses. You helped me to focus on the half-full during a time of much loss in my life.

One reader’s question jolted me. He asked what it was like to change the lives of others. WOW and Thank you. The answer brought back images of people whom I have coached who were blindsided by cancer- and who took control of their healing with some gentle (okay, sometimes more than gentle) prodding from me. The question brought back faces of young children who were being terribly abused and who were put in safer harbors while their parents got their acts together (or not). The answer brought back the faces of my own four daughters and the impact I had on them when they were very young and very small and as they grew into the current towering amazon-like heights that they have achieved.

So, to you, my unnamed reader- and to all of you- I pose the same question-
what is it like to change someone else's life- and your own?
What do you have to gain?
What do we have to lose when we insist on the status quo just like Miss Haversham of Dickens’ Great Expectations?
What is the cost of doing nothing?

How do you deal with the loss inherent in change and how do you change to accommodate the changes that are part of life?

And to all of you, I send deep gratitude, for providing a venue in which I can leap back into life, healed and refueled and even strengthened by the changes life has offered me as opportunities from which I can grow. I thank you for the opportunity, too, to offer words from my heart and right brain as well as words from my left-brain. More importantly, I send gratitude for your words that add to my wisdom about what it means to live on purpose and with passion- In The Zone.

Looking forward and Moving ahead,
Dr. Pam Brill
Mother of Four
Lover of Life
Daughter of Stanley Paul Brill