Are you yearning for something that is not yet? I know I am. How do you feel? Are you hopeful? Anxious? Worried?
To this posture, enter this week's word of the week: wait.
Wait is a verb that means to stay where one is or delay action until a particular time or until something else happens.
Waiting can being some of the most frustrating work we do in life, right? We wait in traffic. We wait for our doctor to call with test results. We come to airports an hour or two early just to WAIT.
So many of us hate waiting, because it feels like wasted time. Can't we just get on with life? Can't we just do what we want?
But from a spiritual perspective, waiting is never wasted time.
Teacher Henri Nouwen offers there's a difference from waiting with an attitude of "just getting on with it" and being fully present in the process. He encourages us to wait with openness to what we might learn in the meantime.
"To wait with openness and trust is an enormously radical attitude toward life. It is choosing to hope that something is happening for you that is far beyond your own imaginings. It is giving up control over your future and letting God define our life. It is living with the conviction that God molds us in love, holds us in tenderness and moves us away from the source of our fear."
If I were to be truthful about what makes me afraid in waiting, it's this: nothing good is going to come in the end.
Maybe I'll get to the front of the line and someone will say, "Sorry we're closed for today."
Or "Sorry you didn't get the opportunity."
Or "No, I really don't have time to work with you on that project."
You know the stuff of life that hurts. Really hurts.
But when we wait with openness and we LET GO of the control we'd like to have over our circumstances--- THIS is when life gets really interesting.
Open-handed waiting prepares our souls for the paths more beautiful than we might have imagined when we first started waiting in the first place!
Hear me say this: waiting mindfully isn't easy to do or even what many of us would choose to do, but if this is the season of life you find yourself in, know you're not alone in your wait. So many of us wait with you in spirit.
Be of good courage. Something good is coming.
XO
Elizabeth
P.S. If you are looking for a good waiting song, my friend, Amanda sent me this recently that I found encouraging. And this new song from Walker Burroughs "Made to Be" I have had on repeat all weekend. Check them out!
