Walking through the park recently, I noticed how different it looks now that the leaves have come out fully.  Views that were available in the winter now are hidden, with green trees and bushes taking up the foreground where, before, there was open space.  A dance of light and shadow, patterns of green and yellow, replace the beiges, whites, and grays of winter.  There’s a completely different feel at every turn, different views all along the way.  What was open and spacious now appears thick with leaves.

As I walked along, I thought about how perspectives change as seasons change.  This got me to thinking about how perspectives change in our lives as we move through different developmental stages.  Each stage has its own particular point of view, and some things that were foreground in one phase become background in another.  Whatever your stage of development today, your priorities and perspective are most probably different from how they were at earlier stages of your life.  Changing life circumstances, unexpected developments, challenges that arise out of nowhere all contribute to shifts in perspective, all contribute to bringing us into new seasons of our lives.

This week’s experiment invites you to notice how your perspective changes over time, and how – just as in Central Park – the perspectives and elements of one season give way to those of the next.  We let go of old ways of seeing things as new ways emerge automatically in the process of development and discovery.  

Also, beliefs about ourselves that were dominant at one phase of life may have dimmed – or strengthened – at another stage.  As you ponder shifts in your perspective over time, notice – as well – shifts in your beliefs about yourself and the world.  If you find that your perspective has shifted in a direction that feels empowered and that supports a sense of well-being, notice what it’s like to nourish that point of view.  If you find that you’ve shifted in a direction that leaves you feeling diminished in any way, experiment with what alternate perspective you can develop that counters this point of view.  The main thing is to notice how perspectives change with different developmental stages, and – as always – to be aware of the ways in which you can impact your thinking by choosing where you want to focus your awareness.