What are you waiting for?

Earlier this week, I posted on Instagram the inner tension I was feeling about September 13, which is the date we Victorians have been told will be the end of stage 4 lockdown.

It appears that this may not happen. September 13 could come and go, and we are told we must get to know our 5km radius a little deeper still.

I had noticed in myself a feeling of tension, wanting September 13 to be the end, but also knowing that whatever happens on September 13, it is entirely out of my control.

To wait for a future that is not guaranteed is a long wait.

What are you waiting for?

For lockdown to end?
For COVID to end?
For the right job?
For the right partner?
For the children to grow older?
For a baby to arrive?
For your weight to be…?

So much waiting.

When I am waiting for things that are out of my control, like a lockdown, it can leave me feeling as if life is on hold.

When I am in the present, not in the unknown future, I am fully aware that life is happening now, all around me.

Knowing this truth allows me to stand where I am and live in the present moment. It allows me to do what I can with my internal and external resources right now.

I found this poem on waiting for the ‘right circumstances’ below.

Your Mission – by Ellen M.H. Gates – (1865)
If you cannot on the ocean sail
among the swiftest fleet,
Rocking on the highest billows,
Laughing at the storms you meet;

You can stand among the sailors,
Anchored yet within the bay,
You can lend a hand to help them
As they launch their boats away.

If you are too weak to journey
Up the mountain, steep and high,
You can stand within the valley
While the multitudes go by;

You can chant in happy measure
As they slowly pass along–
Though they may forget the singer,
They will not forget the song.

If you cannot in the harvest
Garner up the richest sheaves,
Many a grain, both ripe and golden,
Oft the careless reaper leaves;

Go and glean among the briars
Growing rank against the wall,
For it may be that their shadow
Hides the heaviest grain of all.

If you cannot in the conflict
Prove yourself a soldier true;
If, where fire and smoke are thickest,
There’s no work for you to do;

When the battle field is silent,
You can go with careful tread;
You can bear away the wounded,
You can cover up the dead.

Do not then stand idly waiting
For some greater work to do;
Fortune is a lazy goddess,
She will never come to you;

Go and toil in any vineyard,
Do not fear to do and dare.
If you want a field of labor
You can find it anywhere.

Wishing you a weekend where your waiting is overshadowed by living.

Kemi xxx