Hidden shifts underway | May 10, 2021 | Daybreak Note #202

Gorgeous spring, like all transformations, takes time.

Transformation takes time.

In our children, in our country, in our culture, in our neighbors, in ourselves.

In our tulips.

I’ve finally come to terms with the fact that spring does not arrive in New York until May. Yes, technically, spring arrives in March, but that is true only in 10 point Times New Roman font, typed neatly and fallibly on the 20th square on the calendar. The air tells a different truth.

Warm days do pop up in April — one here, one there — and seem momentarily to be harbingers of spring, but they are only the early signals. Snow flurries show up a few days later, just to remind us that we’re not quite fully there yet. The temperatures swing from 70 to 30, and the poor dear budding plants fall back into their frigid states.

All this time, still, change is edging forward.

In Atomic Habits, author James Clear describes the change happening under the surface when we adopt a new habit. Running every day might reveal no instant changes. But something is changing, slowly, slowly, out of sight — until it is finally visible.

James uses the melting point of ice as an example. If you raise the temperature from 0 to 10 degree Fahrenheit, the ice cube seems exactly the same. Up to 20, same. Up to 31, same. Only at 32 does the the transformation begin. But the rise in temperature from 0 to 31 wasn’t for naught. It was an essential part of the shift. It was hidden, out of sight, but no less critical.

Now it is May 10th, and spring is finally, finally here. I feel like throwing a party. The final holdouts, the skinny trees in our backyard that are barren for most of the year, are at last dotted with green. The rolling mountains are deliciously lush, and the buds have sprouted in purples, reds, yellows, pinks, painting streaks of colors on tree branches and across garden beds after a long, grayscale winter.

We are shifting, too, under the surface, out of sight. I’m not sure we even notice it much of the time. A new idea floats in, attached to a new book, or a new story, or a new observation. And change is underway.

Unlike the tulips, unlike the ice cubes, our change is driven by thoughts.

Thoughts, those little sentences in our minds, evoke emotions that propel actions that drive our entire lives.

Here is a thought for today: That big visible change yet to come is propelled by the invisible thoughts running through your mind.

Perhaps this thought gives you hope that the shift you are wishing for is possible. Perhaps such a new hope will lead to a new step today.

Change inches forward, little by little, until the new season breaks through.

Happy Spring, my friends.

With love,
Brianne