Lost and Searching: A Guide to Finding Your Way
Orientation Series #1 – From Overwhelm to Clarity: Your First Step
In this series, I want to share insights from my coaching program in the hope of giving you guidance and tools to navigate your moments of feeling lost. Whether you’re facing a personal dilemma that brings you to your knees or an unsatisfying career that feels like it’s holding you in a chokehold, I want to offer a hand to keep you from falling into the void beneath you.
You may be familiar with this overwhelming feeling of being lost - many people have experienced it at least once in their lives. Like a willow tree at the side of a river, its shadows fall not only over you, sitting under its heavy, green arms, but also over the whole world around you. Or at least it seems that way.
The shade that cools your body can feel refreshing—or ice cold.
Like when you take the wrong exit at a subway station, and your navigation app doesn’t calculate an alternative route fast enough. You feel lost. A little cold.
Or when you accept an invitation, and once you enter the room, you realize you don’t really know anybody. You’re unsure what to talk about or who to approach. You feel lost. A bit chillier.
Or when you wake up one morning, looking at the day ahead, realizing that you hate the decisions that brought you to this moment. You feel lost. Freezing.
All these situations have something in common: they make you feel the depth of a shadow, its cold hands grasping for you. They make you feel lost. The same four letters—L O S T—yet the spaces between them are filled with unique details, the nooks and crannies shaped differently each time.
There are situations where feeling lost is more manageable.
You know your overall destination but are unsure of the exact next steps to take.
You know the next steps to take but are unaware of the overall destination.
Both circumstances bring their own challenges. But both also leave you with something to hold onto. Even though there is still room to explore, experiment, and go with the flow, you have parameters that provide guidance. This level of uncertainty doesn’t quite cross the line into anxiety or a complete sense of being lost.
But if you are unaware of both—your destination and your next steps—the ground seems to open up beneath you. And no matter how fast you react, you can hardly reach for your willow’s arms to keep you from falling. Or at least it seems that way.