What are the major life transitions?

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist, Counselor, and Certified Life Coach.

When does something qualify as a life transition?

I think this is an important question to answer. We need to separate significant life transitions from those everyday occurrences. A life transition is a time when you go through a significant change. The places you go, the people you see, the things you do, all begin to shift.

As a result of these shifts, you begin to change too. You struggle to learn new ways of being. You have to learn new skills. And most importantly, things that used to work for you, either physical or mental skills, don’t work as well as they used to.

I think that life transitions have different significances as we age. Early life transitions can be huge and daunting. Late-life transitions are more likely to be painful and require acceptance. Here’s a brief list of the things that I think of as significant life transitions.

Relationships involve transitions.

Either moving into or out of a family or starting or ending a long-term relationship with other people requires you to make a transition. Those relationships may involve a significant other, a sexual partner, or work relationships. The topic of relationships is often misunderstood. There’s a lot more to relationships than just romantic and sexual connections. If you’ve ever had to deal with an ex, you know that you can have a bad relationship even after the good part of the relationship is gone. In a future post, I’ll talk more about a whole lot of other relationships you need to navigate in your lifetime.

The role you play in life may change.

We transitioned from being children living at home to independent adults with our own places. We become students and then graduates. You may change from one career or occupation to another. You enter a legally recognized relationship, such as marriage or a partnership. Eventually, you may become a grandparent and then someone’s elderly relative.

You acquire or lose privileges.

Getting your driver’s license used to be the major rite of passage. Losing it is a major loss. You may achieve a job or professional title. When you retire, you stop being referred to by that title.

Your body doesn’t work as well as it used to.

Because of injury or disease, there are limitations on the things you can eat, what you can do, and the places you can go. It may involve adaptive technology, such as glasses, hearing aids, or a prosthetic limb.

Your health status may change. When you’re experiencing diseases or illnesses, an increasing amount of your time may be taken up by doctor visits, special diets, and learning to cope with having that condition or illness.

Your economic fortune changes.

There are times in life when your economic fortune moves up, and with that increase comes increased bills and responsibilities. Other people, or you at other times, may move from being someone who can support themselves to someone who needs financial assistance. Some people reach a point of homelessness.

How do you dope with life’s transitions?

So how could these blog posts help you cope with all these things? First, I think it helps to recognize that you are, in fact, going through a transition and that those feelings you’re having are understandable and normal based on what’s happening to you. Secondly, you need to find coping mechanisms to help you get through these transitions.

One of those coping mechanisms will be your friends and support system, and we will talk more about those people in future posts.

This blog will probably bounce around a lot. I’d like to share with you what I’ve learned and what I’ve experienced about navigating life’s transitions.

Recommended Mental Health Books

David Miller at counselorssoapbox.com is an Amazon Affiliate and may receive a small Commission if you purchase a book or product using the link on this page. Using the link will not increase the cost to you.

Does David Joel Miller see clients for counseling and coaching?

Yes, I do. I can see private pay clients if they live in California, where I am licensed. If you’re interested in information about that, please email me or use the contact me form.

Recently, I began working with a telehealth company called Grow Therapy. If you’d like to make an appointment to work with me, contact them, and they can do the required paperwork and show you my available appointments. The link for making an appointment to talk with me is: David Joel Miller, LMFT, LPCC 

Life coaching clients must be working toward a specific problem-solving goal. Coaching is not appropriate if you have a diagnosable mental health problem. Also, life coaching is not covered by insurance. If you think life coaching for creativity or other life goals might be right for you, contact me directly.

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