Facing Chaos: Liminality

I want to share something I read today about the concept of liminality. I was watching "The Drum" (ABC, 6/10/2020) and one of the panelists suggested that we are living in liminal time at the moment. I thought I knew what that might mean. I thought it was the thin layer between the surface of a liquid and the air above it. Turns out I was right and not right.

The word comes from the Latin (as so much of English does) limen which means "threshold' - a point of entering or beginning. 

Panel member Genevieve Bell spoke about a liminal space, a time of transition, of waiting, involving disorientation and not knowing. I am not what I used to be when I crossed that threshold and I don't know what I will become. It is the time between the 'what was' and the 'next'. It is a time when life is forever different, divided between what came before and what comes after. Researchers into this phenomenon call this time a 'rite of passage' or 'liminal space'.

Richard Rohr, an author and Franciscan Friar, describes it as follows:

...we are betwixt and between the familiar and the completely unknown. There alone is our old world left behind, while we are not yet sure of the new existence. That's a good space where genuine newness can begin. Get there often and stay as long as you can by whatever means possible ... This is the sacred space where the old world is able to fall apart, and a bigger world is revealed. If we don't encounter liminal space in our lives, we start idealizing normalcy. (www.liminalspace.org)

While this space brings huge disruption to our lives, it is also filled with deeply transforming possibilities. Many people are beginning to see the effects of the covid-19 pandemic as opening up the possibility for us to enter liminal space and change our lives. We are disoriented and confused, lacking control over our lives and frustrated. But these are the very things that will begin to break down long-held patterns of thinking, systems of belief and habits of behaviour. It is not until we stand on that precipice, balance on that 'liminal edge' and allow ourselves to stay there, that we have a chance to truly re-construct our lives.

The question is, can I sit alone with this reality? Can I clear my mind of the chatter, the endless interpretation and second-guessing to let my life speak to me? Can I allow myself to float on the 'nowhere film' between the water and the air and let it carry me to a place where the past is no more and the future is an exciting but unknowable possibility? Can I just experience the present?

I am reminded of the following biblical and mystical metaphors: the dark night of the soul, the valley of the shadow of death and the fiery furnace. Each of these might well refer also to the liminal space through which we must travel in order to reach the new state of our own evolution. It is instructive to find that the Hebrews of old used the idea of "the valley of the shadow of death" to describe the experience of having to drive their sheep through deep ravines darkened by overhanging walls and desert vegetation in order to reach better pasture.

The whole world is experiencing a dark night of the soul, which did not merely begin with the pandemic. For decades we have been trying to navigate this "darkness" that is both in individuals and in our 'collective consciousness'. Climate change, social upheaval, the human-technological interface, poverty, political oppression, inequality and cultural and environmental destruction are all part of the forces that have brought us here. The pandemic is simply allowing us to see them with new eyes.

This is such a fascinating and thought-provoking idea and, in my opinion, it fits with the present time. I think the challenge is for our society to provide these liminal spaces, these real rites of passage that we so desperately need. This applies especially to our children as they  grapple with this completely radical experience.

I hope that by embracing this "limbo" we are in we can find a way to transform our relationships, our communities and our world.