Has it hit you how many transitions happen this time of year? Graduations happen in May. High school is over, time to go to work, or maybe prepare for the move to college. College is over, time to find that first career step. Many leases run out in May; time to buy that first house. More houses are sold in June and July than any other month. The marriage industrial complex really cranks up in June. Singleness is over; time to figure out how to be married people.

The beginning of summer is often the beginning of a new chapter, a new season in life.
Unless you’re lost in transition; stuck somewhere at the end of the season you just completed, but not very sure of what to do next.

I don’t claim to be an expert on this, but here are some thoughts, based on Solomon’s advice in Ecclesiastes chapter three, that might help.

First, make sure to fully enjoy the season you are in. Maybe you aren’t in transition. Maybe you’re right in the middle of high school, or college, or parenting. Embrace it! Be all the way there! “Life is an hourglass glued to the table,”*  is true. This moment will pass all too soon. Don’t miss it by looking over the horizon.

Second, celebrate the season you just completed, and say goodbye. Did you graduate? Land your first job? Get married? Have your first child? Celebrate the goodness of God in your life for all that has gone before and brought you to this point, put your pictures in a photo album, and let it go. Say goodbye to the past. You won’t be traveling that way again. Let the good memories warm you and the bad ones warn you, but don’t live there. You can’t navigate a successful future by looking over your shoulder.

Third, embrace the road before you with faith, hope, and love. New seasons mean new decisions, new ways of thinking about old problems, new challenges, and new rewards. You won’t always get it right. Make the decision anyway. You won’t always be able to predict the outcome, do your homework and take the next step anyway. You won’t always be immediately appreciated for what you do, keep looking out for the wellbeing of the others around you anyway.

Finally, in all that you do, remember this: the world is a big and beautiful place, “too big for us, yet its satisfactions are too small.”**    We were made for eternity, made for relationship with the infinite Creator. Seek him every step of the way, walk with him through every season, and you will not get lost in transition.

*Anna Nalick, Breathe.
**NIV Study Bible, Ecclesiastes 3:11 notes.