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The LIGHT Process: Making “Light” of Change with Cheryl Eckl

Coping with life changes can be serious business, especially when those transitions involve profound loss of any kind. But what if we decided to make “light” of change? Not to trivialize its impact on us or deny it, but to fully engage it in all its many permutations.

aurora by Thilo Bubek What would happen if we decided to sit with the uncertainty of the Great Unknown that presents itself in change? Who might we become if we were to entertain its creative opportunities? What if we were to identify change’s ambiguity as the Beautiful Middle of Nowhere and approach it as explorers setting off on a new expedition of discovery?

That is exactly what I propose we do together through my LIGHT Process—a five-step process that moves us from chaos to clarity, from shadow to sunshine. Even from death to life, from loss to love.

In upcoming LIGHT Process workshops, webinars, teleconferences, and presentations, you will learn:

The Beautiful Middle of Nowhere

This phrase comes from an article about Death Valley by Peter Fish in Sunset Magazine. When reeling amid change’s upheavals, it’s easy to feel lost in a Death Valley-like wasteland. I’ve definitely been there and it’s not fun. Grieving any loss can be an isolating experience—like being abandoned in the bleakest of landscapes.

But even in the blazing environs of life’s deserts, there is life and hope. And that’s what the LIGHT Process is designed to reveal. For those of us who have not only survived profound change but also found a way to thrive in the process of creating our next chapter, the harsh desert becomes more like a blank canvas on which to create vibrant images of growth and transformation.

Engaging Life’s Biggest Challenge

Change is the most difficult thing human beings do. It means creating new ways of thinking and behaving. And that’s a physical process, as well as a mental and emotional one.

Even when it’s a change we want, altering our habitual patterns is like trying to move the course of a river. In a way, that’s exactly what we’re doing—changing the channel of what we’ve done before.

Change is also frightening because it disrupts our concept of who we are, what we do, how we fit into the mix of our relationships. In other words: We are no longer the person we used to be, but we are not yet the person we will become.

Most of us want to get through that ambiguity as fast as possible. But there is another way. Learning to explore change as opportunity can reap tremendous benefits in all aspects of life.

“Change Is Inevitable. Growth Is Optional”

I’ve had this saying on my wall for years. But only recently have I honestly come to appreciate its full meaning.

As I have gone through my own profound life changes in recent years, it has become apparent to me that what matters most is not so much how we cope with change, but who we become in the process of living within it. I say “living within it” because, for me, really inhabiting change makes all the difference in what comes of it.

Rather than gritting our teeth to merely survive the upheavals that change brings, let us consider the possibility of allowing those rough waters to wash through us, not just over us. This is the lesson I learned during the years of my husband, Stephen’s, illness and death. And, again, as I wrote my book about those experiences.

In October of 2010, the release of A Beautiful Death: Facing the Future with Peace, created a whole new life of accelerated change. And with it has come countless opportunities that are still just beginning to emerge as I embrace this rather mystical landscape of transition.

Embracing the Journey

So, mining the riches of change is the theme of my work these days. I hope it will also become your work as we travel together from nowhere to somewhere. This is a journey unlike any other because of how deeply it challenges us to question our thoughts and feelings about how we engage life’s transitions.

We’re going to take our time, stopping along the way to relish the questions that arise at least as much as the answers that eventually emerge. Because the key to the LIGHT Process is being present in the moment, not rushing ahead to put the past behind us because it was painful. We use the pain as information to move forward, and then the answers come.

It’s not easy; but the process works. I’ve proved it in my own life.
And you can do the same in yours.