The Quiet Work of the Long Middle

Over the past few months, I’ve been thinking differently about what it means to pause.

Not as avoidance or stagnation, and definitely not as “doing nothing.” More like incubation.

That word popped out on the page while still reading When the Heart Waits (yes, this is a slow read for me, there’s a lot to sit with). Not in a spiritual lightning-bolt way, but in that quieter, more unsettling way where something familiar suddenly clicks into place. She talks about waiting not as wasted time, but as the necessary conditions for something new to take shape.

Incubation, at its most basic, just means creating the right environment for development. That’s it. No forcing, no rushing, or premature conclusions. Which, to be clear, does not mean lying on the couch doing nothing, though I briefly tried to sell myself on that interpretation but husband was not impressed.

And once you look at it through that lens, a pattern starts to emerge around how real change actually unfolds.

*Seeds grow underground.
*Babies develop in their mother’s dark womb.
*Caterpillars quite literally dissolve into a chrysalis in the dark before becoming anything recognizable.

All fascinating. All deeply inconvenient.

Especially when you’re someone who likes clarity, progress, and proof of concept. As a visual, creative marketer, this should have been obvious to me. Instead, it landed with the subtlety of a brick — one of those moments where you realize something deeply true at a pace that feels both overdue and perfectly on brand. Oh, Right. Of course. That little chestnut.

I already knew this, intellectually, but given the speed at which I usually move through life, which is more thunderbolt than slow burn, more jet plane than scenic route, this was one of the rare times I actually let the idea sit long enough to digest. Efficiency has always felt like a personality trait. Nothing like realizing something obvious at a very appropriate pace.

What stayed with me wasn’t the metaphor itself, but how quickly it clicked once I let it. Like something I’d always understood in theory, but never fully applied to my own life. Especially now, in the middle of a pivot, wondering why everything feels so… murky. Like I missed a meeting where clarity was handed out.

The uncomfortable truth is that incubation doesn’t look productive. It doesn’t come with milestones or neat updates. It’s quiet, internal, and annoyingly hard to explain, which is deeply unsettling if you’ve spent most of your adult life equating worth with output, momentum, and progress updates. Please tell me this is making sense to at least some of you out there.

And yet, in true Andrea fashion, I’m also sharing it publicly. Which sounds counterintuitive, considering this is very much internal work. Apparently my version of “quiet internal processing” still involves publishing essays on the internet. But both can be true. I’m doing the deep, uncomfortable work behind the scenes, and I’m also bold enough to share it out loud. Writing has always been how I process and articulate, and judging by the messages I’ve received, this phase has resonated more than I expected.

Which brings me to the real challenge.

Understanding this internally is one thing. Trying to explain it out loud, especially to your spouse, is another.

Articulating it to someone who loves you, supports you, and genuinely wants to understand what’s happening can feel surprisingly difficult. I even went as far as admitting to my husband that I’m not the same person he met online over twelve years ago. And that’s a hard thing to say out loud, especially when the earlier version of you was secure, driven, aspirational, independent, and financially self-sufficient — the version they fell in love with.

Letting go of that image takes more courage than I expected, particularly when that version of you no longer exists in the same way. Trying to say, “I’m not stuck, I’m not spiralling, I’m not avoiding responsibility, I’m incubating,” sounds reasonable in theory. In practice, it sounds like you might be one crystal purchase away from a full identity crisis, which, for the record, I am actively trying to avoid.

I can see the wheels turning when I talk about it. He gets the concept. He’s patient. He’s supportive. But there’s also a look that quietly says, Okay… but what does that actually mean for you and for us and our future? And honestly, it’s a fair question.

When you start using words like pause, wait, pivot, incubation, becoming, and alignment in the same conversation, it can begin to sound vague, even to me. There’s no neat storyline, no clear timeline, no tidy explanation that wraps this up with a bow. Just a sense that something needs space before it makes sense. That kind of uncertainty is hard for people who like clarity, or plans, or outcomes, or financial security, or future planning, or literally any sign that this isn’t chaos masquerading as self-awareness.

Sometimes I wonder if from the outside it looks like I’ve lost the plot. To be fair, I’ve wondered this myself, usually while making coffee. Or if people are quietly thinking, Is she okay? Or worse, is this just a phase?

Nothing about this feels dramatic on the inside. It feels quiet, intentional, and very necessary. Less like falling apart and more like stepping back far enough to hear myself think. In my 48 years, I HAVE NEVER DONE THIS.

And no, incubation isn’t flashy. It doesn’t photograph well, it doesn’t come with data, proof points, progress reports, or a guaranteed ROI. It definitely doesn’t make for an easy dinner conversation.

But that doesn’t make it wrong. It just means the work is happening somewhere deeper, in the dark, where it’s meant to. And I’m trusting that the light at the end of the tunnel exists, and that when it does, we’ll find each other, at roughly the same pace I’m moving through this season.