The Liminal Space: Why Transformation Takes Longer Than Anyone Tells You

Do you know the feeling when something finds you at exactly the right moment - something you were not looking for but clearly needed?

That is how this started.

A podcast. Chip Conley talking about midlife. Not as a crisis. As an opportunity. As a chapter that, when navigated with intention, can be the most meaningful of a career and a life.

I was all ears. He was describing what I had already lived through and suddenly it had a name.

That podcast led to a certification in transformational coaching that added a whole new dimension to everything I do.

The in-between. The liminal space. Where you are no longer who you were but not yet who you are becoming. The messy, uncomfortable, necessary middle that most people try to rush through as fast as possible.

I had been there. More than once.

At 35, I left a career I had loved and built something new from almost nothing. Not because I had a plan. Because staying had become impossible. That transition took years, not months. The discomfort was real. The uncertainty was real. And for a long time there was no roadmap, no language, no framework that explained what was actually happening.

That space in between is where most people suffer most. Not because they are doing anything wrong. Because nobody prepared them for how long it takes. How disorienting it feels. How the discomfort is not a sign that something has gone wrong but a sign that something is genuinely shifting.

What the science says

The certification gave me the scientific background I had been looking for. A deep dive into what I had always sensed but could not yet fully explain.

What I found confirmed what I had lived.

Transformation is not a single event. It is a process with distinct phases: an ending, a liminal period, and a new beginning. Most people focus on the new beginning. They want to get there as fast as possible. But the liminal phase cannot be rushed. It has its own timeline. Its own logic. Its own gifts, if you are willing to stay in it long enough to receive them.

Research on human transformation also shows something that reframes everything: we go through this repeatedly. Every few years, in different areas of life, the cycle begins again. A relationship. A career. An identity. A sense of purpose. The rhythm does not stop. It deepens.

And the people who navigate it best are not the ones who push through fastest. They are the ones who understand what is happening and have support while it unfolds.

What this means in practice

When I work with someone in the Generation Experience phase - a professional in their 40s or 50s standing at a crossroads they did not fully anticipate - I am not looking for the fastest route to the next answer.

I am looking for what is actually happening beneath the surface.

What has ended that has not yet been acknowledged. What is trying to emerge that has not yet found its shape. What the person already knows but does not yet trust. What they need to let go of before the next chapter can begin.

This is not standard career coaching. It is not about updating a CV or identifying transferable skills. It is about the deeper process of becoming more fully who you already are, with everything you have built behind you.

That requires a different kind of support. Someone who understands the territory. Who has been there. Who knows that the discomfort of the liminal space is not a problem to be solved but a process to be accompanied.

What becomes possible

When people have language for what they are going through, something shifts. The uncertainty does not disappear. But it stops feeling like evidence that something is wrong and starts feeling like evidence that something is changing.

From there, clarity becomes possible. Direction becomes possible. A next step that fits who you are now, not who you were ten years ago, becomes possible.

That is the work I do inside the Career Happiness Accelerator and through my Generation Experience programs.

Not just the next move. The next chapter. Built with intention, from everything you already are.

If you are in that space right now — between what was and what comes next — you may already know that the people closest to you cannot fully help. Not because they do not care. Because they are too close. They question your decisions. They worry. They project their own fears onto yours.

What you need is someone neutral. Someone who understands the territory without having a stake in the outcome. Someone who can sit with you in the uncertainty without rushing you out of it.

That is what a coach is for. And it is exactly what I am here for.

Details: https://www.violettakrok.com/career-happiness-accelerator or send me a message directly here.