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Coping with chaos and change
NOVEMBER 1996, VOL 64, NO 5 PRACTICAL INNOVATIONS
Coping with chaos and change anet has worked as the neurosurgery team leader on the same perioperative unit for seven years. The unit looks very much like it did the day she started there, and her basic duties are similar. Janet, however, constantly is struggling to keep up with the ever-changing forms and procedure manuals that flood her desk. She studies memos to try to stay abreast of administrative staff changes, and she always must think twice-or three timeswhen asked the name of her employer. The hospital’s new owners seem to come and go as quickly as its patients. Janet is not alone in her frustration. Change and transition today play a bigger part than ever in Americans’ lives. Technologic, economic, and social changes make our country a chaotic place in which to live. The real truth is that if change is happening outside an organization faster than it is happening inside, the organization is in jeopardy. Your main, and perhaps only, competitive advantage as a nurse may be your ability to adapt quickly to change. Fortunately, you can learn strategies that will help you through the emotional wilderness of organizational transition. This article presents several useful strategies.
THE PHASES OF TRANSITION It is important to understand the difference between the terms change and transition. According to one theorist, change is a short-
term, external, situational event to which people must react, whereas transition is the longer-term, internal, psychological reorientation process people go through to deal with change.’ This theorist describes three phases of transition: the ending, the neutral zone, and the new beginning. The three phases are predictable and adaptive, and they always occur, no matter what the change. For example, it does not matter whether you are faced with a work-related event (eg, a staff member calls in sick and you already are shorthanded, you are required to do cross-functional training) or you are faced with a personal event (eg, you have a baby, you are divorcedjyou will go through these phases of transition. If, for any reason, the phases are thwarted or aborted, the change simply fails to “take.” It ends up being a “paper change”-the policy is in the policy manual, you now have new skills you did not care about acquiring, you are a new mother or a single woman-but inside you, nothing is different. The first phase of transition begins with an ending. It always DONNA STRICKLAND, RN, MS, CS, is a national humorist and motivational speaker and a community faculty associate at the Centerfor Human Caring, University of Colorado at Denver.
804 AORN JOURNAL
starts with a separation from, a closure of, or a farewell to the old reality and the identity that went with it. During the ending, you are forced to deal with the losses that change has brought. You must let go of the old, familiar ways of functioning within the organization (or family). This is a time of high denial, followed by grief, loss, and blame (eg, “I feel like I have lost control of my whole life.” “This is a crazy idea, who thought it up?’ “When they see what a mess this causes, they will sure be sorry.”) The next phase is a neutral zone-an in-between state where you are not the old and not yet the new; you are not sure who you are. This is the second phase of transition, and it is a time when your new identity is being formed. Although the neutral zone can be frightening and chaotic, it also is a time during which your creativity and new growth can flourish. Of course, this occurs only if you can tolerate high anxiety and confusion and do not thwart or abort the transition process. During the third phase of transition-the new beginning-you begin to recognize possibilities, learn new skills, and explore alternatives. Eventually, balance, cooperation, and teamwork return to your personal or work environment.
MAKING IT THROUGH THE EMOTIONAL WILDERNESS After you recognize the phases of transition, you can use specific strategies to help yourself get
NOVEMBER 1996, VOL 64, NO 5
through them. For example, during the ending phase you may minimize or completely deny the effects of the changes you face. To help yourself cope, gather information about impending changes so you know what to expect. Give yourself time to digest the information, and then talk with coworkers about what actions might help all of you adjust. Examine the situation so you are clear about what actually is ending, and allow yourself time to grieve. Do not skip this step. Inventory your losses (eg, loss of security, turf, control, friendships, the basic meaning of your life). If you feel sad and overwhelmed, you may try to avoid this painful phase, but grief keeps, and like any other wound, it becomes infected over time. Rituals. Symbolic recognition of endings and losses can be a very powerful “letting go” ritual. One group of perioperative nurses who worked in a hospital that was downsizing made a storyboard of their years together. They included pictures of each other, their patients, their children, and OR equipment they had succeeded in acquiring. The storyboard featured gold and black ribbons-gold to symbolize the work they had accomplished during their years together and black to symbolize their state of sorrow. Conflicts. During the neutral zone phase, you may feel anger, loss, hurt, stubbornness, and selfdoubt. You may blame others for your discontent, complain, or become ill. During this phase, your productivity may decrease because so much of your energy is being redirected into coping tactics. If other staff members in your work group are feeling the same way, communication in your unit will disintegrate as frustration, anxiety, and impatience increase. Discord can arise and teamwork can break down because individuals react to change and transition differently.
Any unresolved team issues will resurface during this time. Tempers may run short, old scars may ache, and impatience and frustration may reign.? These are, however, natural reactions that you can anticipate and manage. Communication. Many perioperative staff groups are using a “check-in” procedure to keep track of how team members are doing during downsizing. At the beginning of report or a team meeting, team members pass around a “talking stick,” and the person holding the stick gets to speak. Each person has approximately one minute to talk about how they are doing that day. Each person has the right to pass the talking stick without speaking. Check-in statements may include the following. “My baby was up all night, and so was I.” “I am worried about Ms Jones. She just does not look right even though the numbers look good. I have spoken with Dr Right, and he says it is my imagination.” “I am stressed and do not have time for this.” Perioperative team members have discovered that when they actually let others know what is happening in their lives, it is much easier to focus, problem solve, and get on with the business at hand. The check-in procedure does not have to be limited to the workplace; it can be used at home, too. Communication is the key to making it through the neutral zone. Listen to your inner voice and express your feelings about the transition. Remind yourself that ambiguity is normal while people work to reorient themselves and redefine their places within the organization. Explore the new organizational environment and the opportunities it brings. Do not try to rush through this phase, even though you will want to because it is so difficult and con805 AORN JOURNAL
fusing. It is important that you work through the neutral zone at your own pace if you are to complete the transition successfully. Layoff SUtViVOrS. Many of the organizational changes taking place in hospitals today involve extensive layoffs, which are traumatic for those who lose their jobs. It is important to recognize, however, that layoffs also are difficult for those who remain. Employees who stay are expected to revitalize themselves and their organization, and at the same time they are made to feel they should be grateful to have jobs3 If you are afflicted with “layoff survivor sickness,” you may experience symptoms such as anger, fear, anxiety, distrust, depression, and guilt? If you do not recognize the real problem, you may stay in the neutral zone or experience layoff survivor sickness for longer than necessary while your morale and productivity plummet. Hopefully, your organization will hire an outside facilitator to intervene and help you and your coworkers process these survivor symptoms and move through this period. New beginnings. It is important to understand that the old “psychological contract” between you and your employer no longer exists. Your employer no longer takes care of you by providing great benefits and educational opportunities. You now must take care of your own needs to ensure that you and the nursing profession “grow up” successfully. With the new psychological contract, the best you can hope for is that your employer cross trains you with new skills that make you more marketable in the everchanging health care arena. During the new beginning phase of transition, you begin to feel at home with what is new. You feel a renewed energy and a sense of commitment to life. Gradually, you will become
NOVEMBER 1996, VOL 64,NO 5
own activities, goals, and priorities. Is this where you want to be? Decide which aspects of your life really are changing, and decide which aspects are finished. Look at yourself creatively, from different perspectives, and Figure 1 Hommering yourself to death Is not DrOdUCyour desires, rive durlng times of change. abilities, and resource^.^ recommitted and refocused, look Experiment with a little change toward the future, and set longeveryday (eg, change a long-standrange goals. The responsibility for ing lunchtime routine, take a differreaching these goals, however, lies ent route to work, rearrange your office or locker, volunteer for a with you. new project, try a new hobby)? Do things that you can control, but do TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF them differently. When anxiety increases, temFocus on the process. Concenpers flare, patience fails, and comtrate on the transition process munication becomes confused, you may feel the urge to help your rather than the outcome. You can make your way through the “emoteammates through the transition. tional wilderness,” even when you You must, however, ensure your own healthy and successful transi- do not know what is on the other tion before you can help others do side. You have no guarantee that the same. This is why it is so the changes you are seeing will end or that they will be successful. important to take care of yourself during this chaotic time. You cannot know which of the nurses on your team will still be Attain knowledge. One selfcare strategy is the attainment of there in one month or one year. Acknowledge the things you canknowledge. The more you know not control, but focus on the things about the transition process, the more prepared you will be to meet you can (Figure 1). Use humor. Use humor to help its challenges. If you can recognize the phases of transition in you cope. Humor, in its most literal sense, does not necessarily yourself and in others, you will understand the feelings and behav- make you laugh. Instead, it helps you maintain “a fluid spirit,” iors that make this time so chalwhich in turn helps you remain lenging. You also will be able to connected and self-regulated. coach yourself during the rough Laughter can help create an envitimes by telling yourself “I’m in ronment that eases the transition, the neutral zone. This, too, shall but it should be used with caution. pass. How can I help myself Overt attempts to lighten the through it?” mood on your unit might be Try change. Use your time in the neutral zone to re-evaluate your viewed as “Band-Aid therapy.” It 806 AORN JOURNAL
would be like trying to stop an arterial hemorrhage with a BandAid-it just will not work. The intervention will be viewed as too superficial. Pay attention to the humor and laughter that develops on a unit. If there is none or very little, it is a symptom that the group is in a great deal of pain. When the time is right to introduce humor, try “low-impact’’ humor first. Low-impact humor is something that happens external to the group, and people can choose whether to participate. Cartoons are an example of low impact humor. They frequently are posted around nurses’ stations and on bulletin boards and certainly can express many types of feelings. Sometimes people have feelings that they are uncomfortable expressing verbally, but when they can look at these feelings external to themselves and recognize them in a humorous way (eg, cartoons), laughter can discharge some of their internal tension. Other therapies. Physical exercise is important and should be a regular part of your routine; however, it is just as important to spend an additional 20 minutes every day just taking care of your “self.” Use regular healing interval breaks or time-outs to escape from the pressures of the workplace. Listen to music, watch comedy videotapes, join a support group, or pray. Call on your spiritual strengths to help maintain your perspective. Remember to foster your relationships with friends, family member, and pets. This is a time when your physical and emotional needs require your attention and loving care.
HELPING OTHERS FIND THEIR WAY By sharing information and fostering communication with coworkers, you can provide anticipatory guidance that will assist them in making their own healthy
NOVEMBER 1996, VOL 64, NO 5
transitions. You must realize, however, that adjusting to change is an individual struggle. Every nurse you work with may react differently to change and remain in each phase of transition for a different period of time. The process cannot be rushed or abandoned without compromising the change or the individual’s opportunity for renewal and development. Humans, in general, do well in environments that allow honest expressions of feelings without repercussion, laughter and humor to distract and ease the tension and pain of the moment, and honest information that is as up-to-date as possible and is empathically delivered. For those of you who are managers, keep in mind that during times of rapid, relentless change, nurses need eight times as much communication, and 50% of that communication should take place in person.’ Also, know that in the absence of real information, people will begin to make up their own information, and by the time management passes on the real information, it is too late. People already will believe their own stories and will not bond to the truth. M. Jean Watson, RN, PhD, FAAN, has written extensively about the carative factors that facilitate true healing in patient-centered care. Her theory of human caringXcan be extended easily to work relationships. Consider establishing a caring-centered commu-
nity in your workplace based on peer discussions about how to support one another during tensionfilled times. Regular dialogue among your team members will help decrease tension. Consider organizing special activities like “laughing spirit listening circles’9 or “healing circles”I0that foster communication and enhance team building. True healing comes from a place deep within us. According to one author, this place is “the laughing spirit,” where “universal perspective and self-awareness” dwell.Il This author believes that one way to gain access to this place is through laughing spirit listening circles, which are group sessions with no discussion leaders or session agendas. Instead, members are allowed to tell their own stories in a place that lets them safely and fully express themselves using true dialogue. These circles are communication formats in which people have the opportunity to be fully heard. I have led healing circlesI2 around the country with workshop participants. This type of circle derives from an ancient healing ritual and is an experience about giving and receiving and an approach to “creating community.” Many groups are forming their own healing circles to create sustainable connections with one another during difficult and trying times.I7 Regardless of the strategies
NOTES 1. W Bridges, Managing Transitions: Making the
Most ofchange (Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley
Publishers, Inc, 1991). 2. Ibid. 3. D M Noer, Healing the Wounds: Overcoming the Trauma of Layoffs and Revitalizing Downsized Organizations (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers,
1993). 4.Ibid. 5. Bridges, Managing Transirions:Making the Most of Change. 6. Ibid.
you use, if you concentrate on being authentic and present during the transition process-instead of pulling your team through the cycle behind you-you all will experience transpersonal learning.14 In other words, if you truly listen to each individual on your team, you will connect with them on a level that enables all of you to make the transition successfully and to learn from each other during the process.
CONCLUSION The flood of change that swirls around you can be frightening. It helps to think of the transition process as a challenge that, if met successfully, will leave you with a sense of accomplishment and personal growth. Knowledge and self-care can help you go with the flow and make this challenge less overwhelming. To thrive in trying times and to go with the flow, you must be willing to w show up, w tell the truth, w be seen, w not know the way, w celebrate the temporary, m be in the moment, review what really matters to you, and w ask yourself if your actions match what you say you value. The journey requires that you be willing to not know the way so you can find your way. You can do it. Good luck. A
7. Bridges, Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change. 8. J Watson, Nursing: Human Science and Human Care: A Theory of Nursing (Norwalk,Conn: Appleton-
Century-Crofts, 1985). 9. L Glickstein, unpublished data, 1995. 10. D Strickland, The Healing Circle (Denver: D Strickland, 1995)Videotape. 1 1. Glickstein, unpublished data. 12. Strickland, The Healing Circle. 13. Ibid. 14. Watson, Nursing: Human Science and Human Care: A Theory of Nursing.
807 AORN JOURNAL
Coping with chaos and change anet has worked as the neurosurgery team leader on the same perioperative unit for seven years. The unit looks very much like it did the day she started there, and her basic duties are similar. Janet, however, constantly is struggling to keep up with the ever-changing forms and procedure manuals that flood her desk. She studies memos to try to stay abreast of administrative staff changes, and she always must think twice-or three timeswhen asked the name of her employer. The hospital’s new owners seem to come and go as quickly as its patients. Janet is not alone in her frustration. Change and transition today play a bigger part than ever in Americans’ lives. Technologic, economic, and social changes make our country a chaotic place in which to live. The real truth is that if change is happening outside an organization faster than it is happening inside, the organization is in jeopardy. Your main, and perhaps only, competitive advantage as a nurse may be your ability to adapt quickly to change. Fortunately, you can learn strategies that will help you through the emotional wilderness of organizational transition. This article presents several useful strategies.
THE PHASES OF TRANSITION It is important to understand the difference between the terms change and transition. According to one theorist, change is a short-
term, external, situational event to which people must react, whereas transition is the longer-term, internal, psychological reorientation process people go through to deal with change.’ This theorist describes three phases of transition: the ending, the neutral zone, and the new beginning. The three phases are predictable and adaptive, and they always occur, no matter what the change. For example, it does not matter whether you are faced with a work-related event (eg, a staff member calls in sick and you already are shorthanded, you are required to do cross-functional training) or you are faced with a personal event (eg, you have a baby, you are divorcedjyou will go through these phases of transition. If, for any reason, the phases are thwarted or aborted, the change simply fails to “take.” It ends up being a “paper change”-the policy is in the policy manual, you now have new skills you did not care about acquiring, you are a new mother or a single woman-but inside you, nothing is different. The first phase of transition begins with an ending. It always DONNA STRICKLAND, RN, MS, CS, is a national humorist and motivational speaker and a community faculty associate at the Centerfor Human Caring, University of Colorado at Denver.
804 AORN JOURNAL
starts with a separation from, a closure of, or a farewell to the old reality and the identity that went with it. During the ending, you are forced to deal with the losses that change has brought. You must let go of the old, familiar ways of functioning within the organization (or family). This is a time of high denial, followed by grief, loss, and blame (eg, “I feel like I have lost control of my whole life.” “This is a crazy idea, who thought it up?’ “When they see what a mess this causes, they will sure be sorry.”) The next phase is a neutral zone-an in-between state where you are not the old and not yet the new; you are not sure who you are. This is the second phase of transition, and it is a time when your new identity is being formed. Although the neutral zone can be frightening and chaotic, it also is a time during which your creativity and new growth can flourish. Of course, this occurs only if you can tolerate high anxiety and confusion and do not thwart or abort the transition process. During the third phase of transition-the new beginning-you begin to recognize possibilities, learn new skills, and explore alternatives. Eventually, balance, cooperation, and teamwork return to your personal or work environment.
MAKING IT THROUGH THE EMOTIONAL WILDERNESS After you recognize the phases of transition, you can use specific strategies to help yourself get
NOVEMBER 1996, VOL 64, NO 5
through them. For example, during the ending phase you may minimize or completely deny the effects of the changes you face. To help yourself cope, gather information about impending changes so you know what to expect. Give yourself time to digest the information, and then talk with coworkers about what actions might help all of you adjust. Examine the situation so you are clear about what actually is ending, and allow yourself time to grieve. Do not skip this step. Inventory your losses (eg, loss of security, turf, control, friendships, the basic meaning of your life). If you feel sad and overwhelmed, you may try to avoid this painful phase, but grief keeps, and like any other wound, it becomes infected over time. Rituals. Symbolic recognition of endings and losses can be a very powerful “letting go” ritual. One group of perioperative nurses who worked in a hospital that was downsizing made a storyboard of their years together. They included pictures of each other, their patients, their children, and OR equipment they had succeeded in acquiring. The storyboard featured gold and black ribbons-gold to symbolize the work they had accomplished during their years together and black to symbolize their state of sorrow. Conflicts. During the neutral zone phase, you may feel anger, loss, hurt, stubbornness, and selfdoubt. You may blame others for your discontent, complain, or become ill. During this phase, your productivity may decrease because so much of your energy is being redirected into coping tactics. If other staff members in your work group are feeling the same way, communication in your unit will disintegrate as frustration, anxiety, and impatience increase. Discord can arise and teamwork can break down because individuals react to change and transition differently.
Any unresolved team issues will resurface during this time. Tempers may run short, old scars may ache, and impatience and frustration may reign.? These are, however, natural reactions that you can anticipate and manage. Communication. Many perioperative staff groups are using a “check-in” procedure to keep track of how team members are doing during downsizing. At the beginning of report or a team meeting, team members pass around a “talking stick,” and the person holding the stick gets to speak. Each person has approximately one minute to talk about how they are doing that day. Each person has the right to pass the talking stick without speaking. Check-in statements may include the following. “My baby was up all night, and so was I.” “I am worried about Ms Jones. She just does not look right even though the numbers look good. I have spoken with Dr Right, and he says it is my imagination.” “I am stressed and do not have time for this.” Perioperative team members have discovered that when they actually let others know what is happening in their lives, it is much easier to focus, problem solve, and get on with the business at hand. The check-in procedure does not have to be limited to the workplace; it can be used at home, too. Communication is the key to making it through the neutral zone. Listen to your inner voice and express your feelings about the transition. Remind yourself that ambiguity is normal while people work to reorient themselves and redefine their places within the organization. Explore the new organizational environment and the opportunities it brings. Do not try to rush through this phase, even though you will want to because it is so difficult and con805 AORN JOURNAL
fusing. It is important that you work through the neutral zone at your own pace if you are to complete the transition successfully. Layoff SUtViVOrS. Many of the organizational changes taking place in hospitals today involve extensive layoffs, which are traumatic for those who lose their jobs. It is important to recognize, however, that layoffs also are difficult for those who remain. Employees who stay are expected to revitalize themselves and their organization, and at the same time they are made to feel they should be grateful to have jobs3 If you are afflicted with “layoff survivor sickness,” you may experience symptoms such as anger, fear, anxiety, distrust, depression, and guilt? If you do not recognize the real problem, you may stay in the neutral zone or experience layoff survivor sickness for longer than necessary while your morale and productivity plummet. Hopefully, your organization will hire an outside facilitator to intervene and help you and your coworkers process these survivor symptoms and move through this period. New beginnings. It is important to understand that the old “psychological contract” between you and your employer no longer exists. Your employer no longer takes care of you by providing great benefits and educational opportunities. You now must take care of your own needs to ensure that you and the nursing profession “grow up” successfully. With the new psychological contract, the best you can hope for is that your employer cross trains you with new skills that make you more marketable in the everchanging health care arena. During the new beginning phase of transition, you begin to feel at home with what is new. You feel a renewed energy and a sense of commitment to life. Gradually, you will become
NOVEMBER 1996, VOL 64,NO 5
own activities, goals, and priorities. Is this where you want to be? Decide which aspects of your life really are changing, and decide which aspects are finished. Look at yourself creatively, from different perspectives, and Figure 1 Hommering yourself to death Is not DrOdUCyour desires, rive durlng times of change. abilities, and resource^.^ recommitted and refocused, look Experiment with a little change toward the future, and set longeveryday (eg, change a long-standrange goals. The responsibility for ing lunchtime routine, take a differreaching these goals, however, lies ent route to work, rearrange your office or locker, volunteer for a with you. new project, try a new hobby)? Do things that you can control, but do TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF them differently. When anxiety increases, temFocus on the process. Concenpers flare, patience fails, and comtrate on the transition process munication becomes confused, you may feel the urge to help your rather than the outcome. You can make your way through the “emoteammates through the transition. tional wilderness,” even when you You must, however, ensure your own healthy and successful transi- do not know what is on the other tion before you can help others do side. You have no guarantee that the same. This is why it is so the changes you are seeing will end or that they will be successful. important to take care of yourself during this chaotic time. You cannot know which of the nurses on your team will still be Attain knowledge. One selfcare strategy is the attainment of there in one month or one year. Acknowledge the things you canknowledge. The more you know not control, but focus on the things about the transition process, the more prepared you will be to meet you can (Figure 1). Use humor. Use humor to help its challenges. If you can recognize the phases of transition in you cope. Humor, in its most literal sense, does not necessarily yourself and in others, you will understand the feelings and behav- make you laugh. Instead, it helps you maintain “a fluid spirit,” iors that make this time so chalwhich in turn helps you remain lenging. You also will be able to connected and self-regulated. coach yourself during the rough Laughter can help create an envitimes by telling yourself “I’m in ronment that eases the transition, the neutral zone. This, too, shall but it should be used with caution. pass. How can I help myself Overt attempts to lighten the through it?” mood on your unit might be Try change. Use your time in the neutral zone to re-evaluate your viewed as “Band-Aid therapy.” It 806 AORN JOURNAL
would be like trying to stop an arterial hemorrhage with a BandAid-it just will not work. The intervention will be viewed as too superficial. Pay attention to the humor and laughter that develops on a unit. If there is none or very little, it is a symptom that the group is in a great deal of pain. When the time is right to introduce humor, try “low-impact’’ humor first. Low-impact humor is something that happens external to the group, and people can choose whether to participate. Cartoons are an example of low impact humor. They frequently are posted around nurses’ stations and on bulletin boards and certainly can express many types of feelings. Sometimes people have feelings that they are uncomfortable expressing verbally, but when they can look at these feelings external to themselves and recognize them in a humorous way (eg, cartoons), laughter can discharge some of their internal tension. Other therapies. Physical exercise is important and should be a regular part of your routine; however, it is just as important to spend an additional 20 minutes every day just taking care of your “self.” Use regular healing interval breaks or time-outs to escape from the pressures of the workplace. Listen to music, watch comedy videotapes, join a support group, or pray. Call on your spiritual strengths to help maintain your perspective. Remember to foster your relationships with friends, family member, and pets. This is a time when your physical and emotional needs require your attention and loving care.
HELPING OTHERS FIND THEIR WAY By sharing information and fostering communication with coworkers, you can provide anticipatory guidance that will assist them in making their own healthy
NOVEMBER 1996, VOL 64, NO 5
transitions. You must realize, however, that adjusting to change is an individual struggle. Every nurse you work with may react differently to change and remain in each phase of transition for a different period of time. The process cannot be rushed or abandoned without compromising the change or the individual’s opportunity for renewal and development. Humans, in general, do well in environments that allow honest expressions of feelings without repercussion, laughter and humor to distract and ease the tension and pain of the moment, and honest information that is as up-to-date as possible and is empathically delivered. For those of you who are managers, keep in mind that during times of rapid, relentless change, nurses need eight times as much communication, and 50% of that communication should take place in person.’ Also, know that in the absence of real information, people will begin to make up their own information, and by the time management passes on the real information, it is too late. People already will believe their own stories and will not bond to the truth. M. Jean Watson, RN, PhD, FAAN, has written extensively about the carative factors that facilitate true healing in patient-centered care. Her theory of human caringXcan be extended easily to work relationships. Consider establishing a caring-centered commu-
nity in your workplace based on peer discussions about how to support one another during tensionfilled times. Regular dialogue among your team members will help decrease tension. Consider organizing special activities like “laughing spirit listening circles’9 or “healing circles”I0that foster communication and enhance team building. True healing comes from a place deep within us. According to one author, this place is “the laughing spirit,” where “universal perspective and self-awareness” dwell.Il This author believes that one way to gain access to this place is through laughing spirit listening circles, which are group sessions with no discussion leaders or session agendas. Instead, members are allowed to tell their own stories in a place that lets them safely and fully express themselves using true dialogue. These circles are communication formats in which people have the opportunity to be fully heard. I have led healing circlesI2 around the country with workshop participants. This type of circle derives from an ancient healing ritual and is an experience about giving and receiving and an approach to “creating community.” Many groups are forming their own healing circles to create sustainable connections with one another during difficult and trying times.I7 Regardless of the strategies
NOTES 1. W Bridges, Managing Transitions: Making the
Most ofchange (Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley
Publishers, Inc, 1991). 2. Ibid. 3. D M Noer, Healing the Wounds: Overcoming the Trauma of Layoffs and Revitalizing Downsized Organizations (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers,
1993). 4.Ibid. 5. Bridges, Managing Transirions:Making the Most of Change. 6. Ibid.
you use, if you concentrate on being authentic and present during the transition process-instead of pulling your team through the cycle behind you-you all will experience transpersonal learning.14 In other words, if you truly listen to each individual on your team, you will connect with them on a level that enables all of you to make the transition successfully and to learn from each other during the process.
CONCLUSION The flood of change that swirls around you can be frightening. It helps to think of the transition process as a challenge that, if met successfully, will leave you with a sense of accomplishment and personal growth. Knowledge and self-care can help you go with the flow and make this challenge less overwhelming. To thrive in trying times and to go with the flow, you must be willing to w show up, w tell the truth, w be seen, w not know the way, w celebrate the temporary, m be in the moment, review what really matters to you, and w ask yourself if your actions match what you say you value. The journey requires that you be willing to not know the way so you can find your way. You can do it. Good luck. A
7. Bridges, Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change. 8. J Watson, Nursing: Human Science and Human Care: A Theory of Nursing (Norwalk,Conn: Appleton-
Century-Crofts, 1985). 9. L Glickstein, unpublished data, 1995. 10. D Strickland, The Healing Circle (Denver: D Strickland, 1995)Videotape. 1 1. Glickstein, unpublished data. 12. Strickland, The Healing Circle. 13. Ibid. 14. Watson, Nursing: Human Science and Human Care: A Theory of Nursing.
807 AORN JOURNAL