What are you waiting for?
We wait a lot. Traffic.
Conversations.
Saying I love you first.
In each of our lives there is something, I know it. That we are waiting to say, waiting to do, we are holding our breath. We keep drawing upon what we believe we could do tomorrow, or someday.
We say that when this looks like that, and they make this change, when I make this much money, when I have this career, this degree, when I am married, when I am no longer married, when I lose 10 pounds…
We will….
What? What will you do?
What I’m interested in is what are you going to do. And how. Who is coming with you, and who is not. I want to know what are you doing today. You and me? We gotta stop banking on tomorrow. Tomorrow is too far away.
A way. It starts with a step. It starts with unbridled courage to fall flat on our face. To get back up. To come undone. To hear things back that are not easy to hear. But to never give up asking. Or trying. To ask the questions that scare the crap out of us, that keep us up at night, we start asking those questions out loud. We say them out loud knowing that the risk is worth the answer we might receive, the one that sets us into a beautiful night of dreaming into tomorrow.
We just might have it. When the night moves to morning, and we wake up to what we said yesterday was the time we would do all the things we promised.
You’ve been waiting a long time.
Lets trust a little more. I think that we could. Lets be so clear on what we want our lives to look like, feel like, that when tomorrow comes, we say thank you. Loudly. The only sound louder, are the questions we continue to ask, the answers we continue to seek, the people who we continue to love, and love for the first time…those first few paragraphs of a love story. Lets write those. Ready, I’ll start.
“I knew I loved you when..."
I watched the news this morning, The people waiting in line for hours, some people days, what they wanted, wanted, what they must have. There is no nourishment in things, you cannot eat your TV. That person you waited in line for, would it be enough to tell them you loved them? Could you show them instead? I barely remember anything my parents got us for Christmas. But I remember how we used to pile into our old-falling-apart-Chrysler 5th avenue, and we would drive to see the lights. My Dad always worked on Christmas, so they convinced us that Santa came special on Christmas eve when we would take that drive. We would sing at the top of our lungs, Christmas carols. We would ooh and ahh at the neighbors homes. My mom loved the rendition of the chipmunks singing Rudolph the Red Nose reindeer, so because she loved it, I loved it too. It was enough. They couldn’t afford much…my parents…I mean Santa…but I remember the drive more than I remember anything. I’d give anything to pile into that piece of shit car again with my mom, dad, and sister as my Dad drove too fast down snowy residential roads with my mom and sister screeching for him to slow down, and me clapping, pleading for him to speed up (some things never change : )
When I saw the news this morning. I had this moment where I thought of my time in Kenya. They come and they go, and I’m aware that in this moment I was feeling judgment. But I thought of the Kibera slum where I spent many many days participating in the yoga classes taught by the always-amazing Africa Yoga Project teachers, and the line of women I would always see here, carrying large jugs on their heads and in their arms. They would wait for hours and hours and hours. They would walk so long. They would wait. And be patient. And wait.
These women, they wait for water. A clean water project in the heart of Kibera where people can come fill their jugs always has a line, many times one you cannot see the end of.
Id watch them, in their beautiful colors, the bold patterns on their skirts, their soft smiles, their seen-a-lifetime eyes: balancing unmanageable combinations of water and baskets and babies on their hips….waiting.
They wait and wait so that their family can drink, and wash their hands. They wait to have clean water to clean old wounds. They wait for the relief that today, there will be water.
And when it is their turn. They fill up, and then they begin to walk home. They take one step, and then take one more, and so it goes. The courage to step forward. The clarity to know what is really worth waiting for in this life.
We spend so much time waiting, but not for nourishment. We spend so much time thinking, but not to liberate our beliefs. We are bold in our expectation for tomorrow, but limited in our actions today.
Ask big questions. Dance. Say that you are sorry. Fall in love. Ice skate. Quit your job. Book a vacation. Stay in bed. Kiss. Plant a garden. Walk a dog, any dog. Read under a tree. Paint. Listen. Buy the expensive chocolate. Road Trip. Fail. Try again. Fail. TRY AGAIN.
What are you waiting for…
Lets stop waiting. One-foot forward. That’s how it starts. Be sure you know what you are waiting for, that it is worth your time.
Nourish.