Stage 2: Life Context | What You're Leaving Behind

Before you design forward, you have to let go of something. Maybe even a whole life or maybe just a version of yourself, or a belief that kept you safe for 10 years but started suffocating you at year 11.

Most people skip this part and leap straight from dissatisfaction to action, new goals, new plans and fresh starts. But they drag the old stuff with them like a suitcase they forgot to unpack. The old identity, the old expectations, the unprocessed grief of the thing that didn't work out, the guilt of leaving behind people and places that shaped them. It sits in the background, quietly sabotaging the new thing.

This section is your chance to close the chapter properly. To name what you're releasing, acknowledge what it gave you, grieve what it cost you, and consciously decide what you want to carry forward. It's the emotional and psychological equivalent of cleaning out a house before you move. You don't throw everything away - you sort through it. Some things come with you, some things get donated, and some things you've been holding onto for reasons you've forgotten.

This is where the Stage 2 of this course ends, after you consciously close the door on the old frame so you can step into the new one with a clear mind.

The research behind letting go

Transition theory: endings come first

William Bridges, an organisational consultant and former literature professor, published one of the most influential models of life transition in 1980. His book Transitions drew a sharp distinction between change and transition. Change is the external event: the job loss, the move, the breakup, the diagnosis. Transition is the internal psychological process of coming to terms with the change. They are connected, but they are different processes on different timelines.

Bridges proposed that every transition has three phases. First is the ending, where you let go of the old situation, identity, and assumptions. Second is the neutral zone (he borrowed the term from anthropological studies of ritual), a disorienting in-between period where the old is gone but the new hasn't solidified. Third is the new beginning, where a renewed sense of identity and purpose starts to form.

The critical insight here is that transitions start with endings. Most people try to jump straight to new beginnings, and they wonder why the fresh start feels somewhat empty or keeps falling apart. The ending needs to happen first! We have to let go of what was before we can fully engage with what might be.

Bridges identified 4 things people need to let go of during an ending: relationships (not always the people themselves, but the specific dynamic or role within the relationship), turf (the familiar setting, routines, territory), structures (the schedules, patterns, and frameworks that shaped daily life), and the future we had imagined (the plans, expectations, and projected trajectory that no longer applies). That last one is often the hardest, because we grieve a future that never happened.

Disenfranchised grief and ambiguous loss

Pauline Boss, a family therapist at the University of Minnesota, spent decades studying what she called ambiguous loss: grief for things that don't fit neatly into traditional categories. A person with dementia is physically present but psychologically absent. A family member who emigrated is alive but gone from daily life. Boss argued that ambiguous loss is the most stressful kind of loss because it defies closure. There is no funeral, no clear end, no social script for how to mourn.

Life transitions produce a particular form of ambiguous loss. You might grieve a career you chose to leave. You might grieve a friendship that simply faded. You might grieve the person you used to be, who no longer fits. Kenneth Doka's concept of disenfranchised grief (1989) adds another layer: some losses are not socially recognised. Nobody sends a card when you leave a stable job to pursue something uncertain. Nobody holds space for your sadness about outgrowing a community. You're expected to celebrate the new thing, not mourn the old one.

But unprocessed grief has a way of showing up uninvited. It appears as resistance to the new path, unexplained sadness, self-sabotage, or a nagging sense that you made a mistake. The ritual in this section gives the grief somewhere to go.

Narrative identity and life story coherence

Dan McAdams, a personality psychologist at Northwestern University, has spent 30 years researching how people construct their life stories. His narrative identity framework proposes that we understand ourselves through the stories we tell about our lives, and that psychological wellbeing is closely tied to the coherence and redemptive quality of those stories.

McAdams found that people who construct redemptive narratives (stories where difficult experiences lead to growth, wisdom, or positive change) tend to show higher levels of generativity, wellbeing, and mental health. People who construct contamination narratives (stories where good things are ruined or leads to bad outcomes) tend to show lower wellbeing and more depressive symptoms. His research, published extensively in the Journal of Personality and Psychological Review, suggests that the way you narrate your past directly shapes your capacity to engage with your future.

The leaving-behind ritual here asks you to write a specific kind of story: one that honours what was, acknowledges the cost, and extracts the meaning. This is narrative identity work. You're editing the story, not to erase the hard parts, but to make sure you're the author.

Psychological closure

Arie Kruglanski's need for closure research, spanning 3 decades of work at the University of Maryland, examines how people differ in their tolerance for ambiguity and their desire for definitive answers. People high in need for closure tend to make quick decisions, stick rigidly to plans, and feel uncomfortable with unresolved situations. People low in need for closure tolerate ambiguity better but may procrastinate on decisions.

Life transitions sit in the middle of this tension. You need enough closure on the old chapter to move forward with conviction, but enough openness to stay flexible as the new chapter unfolds. The exercises here are designed to give you a sense of completion without false certainty. You close the door, but you don't lock it and throw away the key. Some things you leave behind might circle back in a different form. The point is to choose consciously what you carry and what you set down.

Ritual and psychological processing

Anthropological research on rites of passage, from Arnold van Gennep's 1909 framework to Victor Turner's work on liminality, consistently shows that rituals help people process transitions. The ritual provides structure for an experience that would otherwise feel formless. It marks the moment of change, gives it symbolic weight, and signals to both the individual and their community that something has shifted.

Michael Norton and Francesca Gino at Harvard Business School published a 2014 study in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General showing that rituals reduce grief after loss. Participants who performed a ritual (even a newly invented one with no cultural tradition behind it) reported lower feelings of grief than those who didn't. The ritual didn't have to be elaborate or spiritual, but it had to be intentional and structured.

The exercises in this section function as a secular ritual.

The leaving behind ritual

Take your time with this section. It works best if you do it in one sitting, somewhere quiet, with no distractions. Some people find it useful to light a candle and mark the space as different from everyday life. The ritual doesn't have to be spiritual but it should feel intentional.

Access the Notion workbook here.

Part 1: Name what you're leaving

Write down the things, situations, identities, habits, relationships, beliefs, and expectations that belong to the chapter you're closing. Be specific. "My old life" is too vague. "The version of me who said yes to everything because I was afraid of being disliked" is specific. "The expectation that I would be a partner in that firm by 35" is specific.

• Name the category - what you're leaving behind

Categories to consider: identity/self-concept, relationship or role, career or work pattern, belief or assumption, habit or coping mechanism, expectation or imagined future, place or environment, community or social world

Part 2: Honour what it gave you

Everything you're leaving behind served you once. The coping mechanism that now suffocates you kept you safe in a harder season. The job you outgrew taught you skills you'll use forever and the relationship that ended shaped who you are in ways you can't undo and probably wouldn't want to.

For each item you listed above, write what it gave you and be generous! This is the gratitude part, and it only works if it's honest.

Part 3: Acknowledge what it cost you

Now the other side. What did it take from you? What did you lose, miss, suppress, or sacrifice to maintain each thing? Try to catalogue the full cost so you can make better trades in the next chapter.

Part 4: The suitcase and the bonfire

Imagine that you're standing at the threshold between chapters and you have a suitcase and a bonfire. The suitcase holds what you're carrying into your next chapter: the skills, the lessons, the relationships, the qualities, and all of the hard-won wisdom. The bonfire, on the other hand, is where you leave the rest: the identities, the expectations, the patterns, the obligations that no longer serve you.

Sort through everything you've listed above, knowing that some things belong in the suitcase because they still serve you, while others belong in the bonfire because they've done their work and it's time to let them go. And some things might be ambiguous, sitting in a grey zone where you're not sure yet. That's fine, make sure you place them separately.

• The suitcase (carrying forward):

• The bonfire (releasing):

• The grey zone (not sure yet):

Part 5: Unsent letters

Pick 2 items from your bonfire list. The ones with the most emotional charge. Write a short unsent letter to each one. Address it directly: "Dear perfectionism," or "Dear version of me who thought success meant never resting," or "Dear the flat in Bristol where I learned who I was."

Say what you need to say. Thank it, acknowledge the hurt, and say goodbye. You, of course, don't have to send it anywhere or even show it anyone. The writing itself is the ritual.

Unsent letter 1

To: _____________

Unsent letter 2

To: _____________

Part 6: Reflect

• What surprised you about the sorting process? Did anything end up in a different pile than you expected?

• Is there anything in the bonfire that you feel guilty about releasing? What does that guilt tell you?

• What's in your grey zone? What would help you decide: more time, more information, or permission?

• How does your body feel right now? Lighter? Heavier? Unsettled? Relieved? There's no wrong answer.

• If the version of you from 5 years ago could see what you're choosing to carry forward, what would they think?

Part 7: Your transition statement

Write a short statement (a few sentences, a paragraph at most) that captures where you stand right now.

Part 8: AI companion (optional)

How to use: Share the items from your leaving-behind list with the AI, along with your initial sorting. The AI is particularly good at helping you spot things you're holding onto for the wrong reasons, and at helping you articulate what you're feeling. Give yourself at least 30 minutes for this conversation - it can get emotional. :)

Copy and paste the prompt below into Claude, ChatGPT, or any AI assistant:

You are a compassionate life design coach helping me process a life transition. I'm at a threshold between chapters, and I need help identifying what I'm leaving behind and what I want to carry forward. I'll share what I'm releasing and what it meant to me. Your job is to:
(1) Help me see what each thing gave me and what it cost me, without rushing me past the grief,
(2) Ask me whether each item belongs in the suitcase (carrying forward), the bonfire (letting go), or the grey zone (undecided),
(3) Gently challenge anything I might be holding onto out of guilt, obligation, or fear rather than genuine desire,
(4) Help me write a threshold statement that captures where I stand right now.
Be warm. Be patient. Don't try to fix or optimise. Sometimes things just need witnessing. One question at a time. If I'm processing something heavy, just be present with it before moving on.

______________

You've now completed Stage 2. You've mapped who you are, the context of your life, the problem you're facing, and what you're choosing to leave behind. This becomes the opening artefact of Stage 3.

An important note:

If this section brought up difficult emotions, know that it's totally normal and an absolutely healthy response to loss, including the loss of identities, expectations, and life structures. You don't need to resolve everything here, but you can know that you've started a process. If you're finding the emotional weight of this work overwhelming, consider speaking with a therapist or counsellor who works with life transitions. A good therapist is a guide who can walk with you through the rougher terrain.