If I knew I would die on a Thursday, would I be as anxious to get to Friday?
Waiting is something I’ve done a great deal of in this life. It has taught me both vigilance as well as patience. Waiting has been my teacher in nonattachment. As a kid, it was so hard for me to pause, both because I was an active child but also because I loved outdoor adventure. It was all I could do to sit tight and wait until the next camping trip, the next fishing excursion. It seemed to my child’s mind that all I did was wait. And wait some more.
Yet in these times, there is very little that is predictable. Waiting on situations to change or for people to shift aside selfish motives and embrace planetary stewardship in earnest is an exercise in something far beyond ordinary waiting. It’s a waiting that may never end.
Embedded within this realization lies the inevitable bevy of opportunities: the gift of enlarging my compassionate nature. The advantage of deepening my inner practice, achieving greater parity in walking my talk. Discovering stillness in the valley of distress. Ferreting out redemptive value amidst the rubble of the mind’s landfill.
Pretty beautiful landfill!
Haha Hariod, thanks so much, as always 😉
H <3
Loved the post Bela.
Reading it, I get the sense that ‘Waiting’ is really not who you intrinsically are but who have “wound up becoming” as you have negotiated life’s challenges and pitfalls. But you have also so beautifully captured the myriad ways that waiting has served you in life.
I suppose your life experience holds true for most of us as age brings its own controls in terms of maturity and less reactiveness. And speaking of waiting,we do not really need to wait for situations to change. We need to gain the wisdom to change the context through which we see it.
Blessings
Shakti
Good points, Shakti, as always. And yes, the context through which we see things is important, for sure. As I continually find myself saying, ‘Either it’s all perfect or none of it is.’ We are One. So I choose to see the perfection, even in the perceived insanity. That is the work, for me. Aloha and Namaste.
Yes. 🙂
I really enjoyed this deep post and your philosophy shown here. I especially liked the poetic expression you closed this with, “Ferreting out redemptive value amidst the rubble in the mind’s landfill. Wow, Bela! Bellisimo!
Muchas gracias mi amiga 😉
I saw a film recently in which ‘god’ was deposed, and a small girl took his place and told every person on earth their death date. Many flocked to the beaches, some, knowing they would die very soon left their partners and acted very selfishly, most started doing what they really wanted to do, but only if they had the time. One chap, who knew he would not die for many, many decades, kept jumping off tall buildings and doing the most ridiculous stunts, and he was so, so giddy with it, knowing he could do that, take that chance. Of course one can always end up alive but paralyzed . . . hahahahaha. It looks awful laughing after that paragraph. But it was a fascinating scenario. We shouldn’t know methinks. Thankfully esme is endless. *winks*
– esme upon the Cloud looking for more spoons and aiming to revisit Bela soon <3
You must tell me the name of that film. Please and thank you 😉 I was laughing right along with you; so much for my morbid sense of humor! But really, people can be stupid. I mean, let’s face it, those scenarios and more would definitely play out if such a thing were possible to predict. I’m so glad Esme is endless, you goddess, you. (And if you really need some spoons, I’ve always got some spares hanging from a windchime out back. Real sterling and all) 😘
I can’t, I’ve told you too much.
Hahahahahaha.
– esme sliping a few of them there spoons in her napsack and giving Bela a hug aupon the Cloud
Oh, you wicked sorceress! <3