Every Change is a Death of Something

Change is in the air and there's absolutely nothing I can do about it.

Photo by Ross Findon on Unsplash

As the embers of autumn grow weary and gloam draws in, tightening its grip daily on our diurnal rhythm, we can feel the end of a cycle closing in from every corner like the shadows of a vignette. The year is spent, renewal is just around the corner. 

In a yoga class this week, my teacher focused our thoughts on change, touching upon the types of suffering which Buddhists see as universal truths. Homing in on the suffering of change, her words resonated in a stomach curdling way. Change in all its senses, marks the beginning of a fresh start. At the same time, of course, it represents the closing and death of something else.

In this particular moment, I feel so proximate to the precipice of a shift, my roots pulling up, easily jiggled inside my joints like a loose tooth. I can taste the end of this era, one in which I have been so grounded and exquisitely content. I can remember how it felt not to be so, and an abject sense of dread pulses through as the tectonic plates of my life reconfigure below.