(and How to Shed the Old Stories Holding You Back)

If you’ve been expecting change to feel lighter by now, but it doesn’t, you’re not imagining things.

I went into this year with a quiet hope that the energy would shift quickly. With all the talk of the Year of the Fire Horse, I half-expected momentum to arrive early. Instead, January felt heavy. Familiar. Full of the same things I thought I’d already dealt with.

At one point I remember thinking, has this fire horse completely missed me?

As it turns out, the Fire Horse energy doesn’t officially begin until mid-February. Which helped, but it also got me reflecting on something deeper: why change so often feels slow, uncomfortable, and frustrating, even when we’re doing all the “right” work.

Change Rarely Moves in Straight Lines

One of the biggest myths about change is that if we do the inner work, the external world should respond quickly.

In my experience, that’s rarely how it works.

Last year — the Year of the Snake — was a perfect example. Externally, very little changed for me. If I’m honest, it felt like a poor year for results. Things didn’t move. Nothing dramatically improved.

Internally, though, a lot shifted.

I did deep inner work. I reflected. I questioned my goals, my identity, how I show up in my life. I worked shamanically. I paid close attention to my inner landscape.

And now, I find myself in that in-between space; waiting for the outer world to catch up with the inner shifts.

If you’re there too, I see you. It’s frustrating. And it’s also normal.

I recorded a podcast episode about this – find it HERE.

Why the “Mushy Middle” Is Part of the Process

During my Martha Beck training, she used the metaphor of a caterpillar turning into a butterfly to describe change. It’s stuck with me ever since.

Before the butterfly emerges, the caterpillar doesn’t neatly upgrade itself. It dissolves. Completely. Into mush.

Only from that apparent nothingness does something new form.

We often forget this part. We want clarity, momentum, and direction, but we’re still in the dissolving phase. We’re in the cocoon, wondering why nothing makes sense yet.

And the truth is, change is uncomfortable because it requires us to let go of who we were before we can fully step into what’s next.

Serpent Medicine: The Art of Shedding Old Stories

In Andean shamanic medicine, the cycle of change is represented by the medicine wheel. The first stage begins in the South, with Serpent.

Serpent medicine is about shedding.

Not forcing change.
Not rushing forward.
But letting go of old stories, identities, and beliefs that no longer fit.

We all carry stories from the past; things that happened to us, conclusions we drew, roles we learned to play. Over time, those stories quietly become part of our identity.

The problem is, as long as we keep telling the same stories, we stay in the same place.

This is one reason I think some forms of talk therapy can be unhelpful if they don’t move with the cycle of change. Rehashing the past again and again can keep old narratives alive, rather than helping us shed them.

Serpent work asks a different question: what am I still carrying that has already expired?

The Rest of the Cycle: Fear, Joy, and Direction

Once shedding begins, the medicine wheel moves on:

• Jaguar (West) invites us to face the fears and beliefs that keep us in our comfort zone
• Hummingbird (North) reconnects us with joy, purpose, and what lights us up
• Eagle (East) helps us bring vision into reality and move forward with clarity

But none of those stages work properly if we skip Serpent.

Without shedding the old skin, we keep dragging the past into the future.

Four Questions to Support Your Own Shedding Process

These are questions I return to again and again, especially when change feels sticky or slow:

1. What part of my current life story has already expired — but I’m still carrying it anyway?
2. Where am I choosing familiarity over aliveness?
3. What does my body tell me about the situation I wish I didn’t have, but keep participating in?
4. What am I afraid would unravel if I stopped telling this story?

These aren’t questions to rush. They’re invitations to listen; especially to the body, which often knows long before the mind catches up.

A Gentle Invitation

If you’re right at the beginning of a change cycle; feeling the heaviness, sensing something is over, but not yet moving forward, I’m hosting a live online workshop to support this exact phase.

Ending an Era – A Serpent Workshop for Conscious Shedding
Thursday 5th February | Live on Zoom
£22 | Replay included

It’s a grounded, practical 60-minute workshop where I’ll guide you through identifying and releasing the stories that are keeping you where you are, so you’re ready when momentum returns.

You can find the details and sign up at:
www.emmaobriencoach.com/endinganera

Change doesn’t arrive on demand.
But when we stop resisting the shedding phase, movement comes more cleanly than we expect.