Bailey — From Pops: Standing and Staying When Life Is Unfinished

Personal Standalone Reflection

Bailey,

I wanted to follow up with you on the conversation you, Sussa, and I had this past Thursday morning. Not as advice. Just as something I’ve learned and wish I had understood earlier in my life.

There are seasons in life when you are not lost, but you are not settled either. Nothing is wrong, yet nothing feels finished. The old way of seeing things no longer works. The new way has not arrived yet.

That space has a name. It’s called liminal space.

Liminal space answers one question. Where am I? I am between what was and what is becoming.

What it does not answer is the harder question. How do I live here faithfully? That’s where two words matter. Stand. Stay.

Standing means you do not retreat just because clarity is missing. You do not abandon what you already know is true. You remain upright when it would be easier to give up or numb out. Standing is not aggressive. It is a quiet resolve.

Staying means you do not rush ahead to escape the discomfort. You remain present. You let the moment finish its work. You don’t demand answers before trust has time to deepen.

Staying is not passive. It is patient.

Standing keeps you from collapsing. Staying keeps you from running.

Together, they form a way of living that is alert without being anxious. Grounded without being rigid.

This is where God’s Spirit works most deeply. Not when everything makes sense. But when you keep choosing to stand and stay while things are still forming.

Your choices matter here. But they are not what makes transformation happen. They are how you cooperate with what God is already doing beneath the surface.

Liminal space is not wasted time. It is forming time.

If liminal space helps you name where you are, standing and staying show you how to live there.

You don’t need to force clarity. You don’t need to escape the tension. You are allowed to live faithfully before everything makes sense.

Love, Pops