Fall has never particularly been one of my favorite seasons. Sometimes I wonder whether it falls lower on my list because of my challenges with transitions. Going from warm days, bare feet, and sleeveless shirts to rain, gloomy skies, and shorter days is difficult for me. The sun leaving the sky at what feels like four o’clock in the afternoon does not help.
Although, I will admit that the transition from fall to winter is a little less shocking. So perhaps there is value in the very thing I struggle with. Fall gives me time to prepare. The temperature does not usually change immediately. There are days when summer seems to return for a visit, followed by days that remind us winter is on its way. Even as I resist the transition, fall is helps me to move through it.
I also think about the role my own anxiety plays in how I experience this season. Admittedly, I have never been particularly good at letting things go. I can understand that something has reached the end of its season and still find myself trying to negotiate a little more time. Perhaps if I hold on differently, try a little harder, or wait a little longer, I will not have to experience the uncertainty that comes with releasing it. I pull into the garage after work and sit for thirty minutes to transition. I get to work an hour early so my nervous system has a chance to adjust. Change and transitions are hard.
And, as someone who has long experienced anxiety, I sometimes look to nature for lessons. I do not always enjoy the lesson, but I ALWAYS find it valuable.
During a conversation with a therapy client, I described the beauty of fall through the changing colors of the leaves. But even that beauty is part of a transition. The leaves are changing in preparation for falling. What we stop to admire is also evidence that something is coming to an end.
At one point, I joked, “Can you imagine if trees had anxiety?”
We both chuckled.
Trees offer a master class in letting things go. And yet, I could imagine a great oak tree standing in the middle of a familiar neighborhood, looking at the leaves she had carried for months and deciding that this year, she simply could not do it.
“I don’t know what comes next,” she might say. “What if my leaves don’t come back? What if I let them go and I’m left standing here, exposed? My leaves are part of how people recognize me. They sit beneath my shade. They admire my branches when they are full. Who will I be when all of that is gone?”
And perhaps the thought that would feel most familiar to me:
“I know I have made it through this before, but what if this time is different?”
I imagine her trying to hold each leaf a little tighter, treating every gust of wind as something to defend herself against. Perhaps she would mistake holding on for preparation. Perhaps she would believe that if she could preserve the appearance of summer, she could somehow prevent winter from arriving.
But the season would continue to change around her.
That is one of the difficult things about transitions. Our resistance does not always stop them. Sometimes it means we are trying to live in a season that has already ended, spending our energy preserving something while everything around us is asking us to respond to what is happening now.
Those leaves are significant. They were part of the tree’s life. They helped sustain her through a season and they provided a home, protection, and shade for others. Letting them go does not mean they were a mistake, or that their contribution becomes less meaningful because their time has ended.
I need that reminder, too. Something can have mattered so deeply and still be something I need to release. I do not have to diminish what it meant to acknowledge that I cannot keep carrying it in the same way.
And the tree does not lose everything when her leaves fall. Her roots remain. Her trunk remains. The branches that held those leaves remain. So much of what sustains her becomes less visible to those of us walking past.
Perhaps that is another part of the lesson. When something familiar falls away, I can become so focused on what is missing that I forget to notice what is still holding me. I can lose sight of the roots and their needs. I can forget that it is actually the roots and the truck and the branches that sustain the leaves. The moment forces us to remember - if we allow it.
Today, as I look out at the tree-lined streets, I notice trees in different stages of this transition. Some are still wearing their decorative outfits, full of gold, orange, and red, almost as though they are celebrating before they release what they have held for a season. The tree lined streets with all of their colors are a sort of transition party. Others have already begun letting go, their leaves gathering beneath them. Some remain green, and I find myself imagining that they, too, are hoping for a few more warm days. I want to hug them and encourage them that letting go is ok. Talk about being a tree hugger, right?
Of course, I am giving the trees my own feelings. After all, people are just plants with different language, right? But perhaps that is part of why the analogy stays with me. I recognize myself in each of them. Sometimes I can appreciate the beauty of change. Sometimes I am already moving through the loss. Sometimes I am still asking for more time.
The client and I paused after our laughter and sat in quiet reflection.
There is something vulnerable about the space between letting go and seeing what comes next. The tree does not release a leaf and immediately receive another one. There is a period of standing with less. A period when, to someone passing by, very little may appear to be happening.
I think that is often the part I want to skip. I want to release something only when its replacement is ready. I want reassurance that the next season will be good before I agree to leave the familiar one.
But I am learning that I cannot always have that reassurance. Some things may return in a different form. Some may never return. Even the tree’s new leaves will not be the exact leaves she released. There is room for grief in that, even when growth eventually follows.
Perhaps fall continues to challenge me because it makes this lesson so visible. Everywhere I look, something is changing, releasing, preparing. And I am reminded that health, life, and growth sometimes ask us to loosen our grip.
I may never love fall the way I love summer. But I am beginning to appreciate what it offers me. I am allowed time to adjust, beauty within the transition, and a reminder that I can feel uncertain about what comes next and still allow the season to change.
