"Patience is a virtue."
So on and so forth...
Rumor is the above lessons get easier as one ages. So how come I'm still waiting for relief? I find myself on the precipice of a life altering career opportunity, awaiting word from my potential, new employer that will undeniably alter the next chapter of my journey on every conceivable level - geographically, professionally, personally, romantically, quality of life. EVERYTHING. It is the dream. With only a few days to go until I get the official word as to whether the job is mine, I find myself enduring excruciating, painful feelings of limbo, and stagnancy. The fallout of being unable to move forward of my own accord has made me hate where I am right now in such an intense way, it's all I can do not to walk into my current boss's office and lay out everything I can't stand about the job, about him, his lack of integrity, his inability to see my value and talent, and how the cynical negativity I have to endure on a daily basis affects my organic, state of being which is in direct opposition to his. I'm Tigger to his Eeyore. It seems that the contrast between what my future could look like, and where it's currently at has suddenly caused me great discomfort in my previously well-worn skin. And as a 40 year old woman, shouldn't I be able to kick back and await the natural outcome without feeling this way? Delayed gratification/maturity/patience/virtue etc?
I so much want to be the guru of grace, the poster child of tranquility, the meditative master. Instead, my stomach is in knots, I have to hold back the urge to throw down with my colleagues, and I am consumed with the notion of what I will do on the off chance it doesn't happen. Except that logically I know it will. My potential new employer has pretty much laid out that I am indeed their girl. Corporations are slow moving trains and waiting out their internal machinations and protocol while due diligence is being conducted up the yin yang, is a torture I wish on no human being.
So I ask the universe what the gift in all of this is? Is this part of my growth, another lesson in a long line of things I am destined to master? Perhaps this limbo is a little taste of having to manage my natural desire to move at lightning speed. After all, if I am to hold a senior executive position at a major corporation, the rate at which decisions are made will be out of my hands so I had better get used to that now. Then there's the little matter of "self soothing", something I haven't had to do for a while. My current situation is a fresh, daily reminder that working gracefully through uncomfortable feelings and trusting the old adage that "this too shall pass" is a treasured skill set I can apply to all aspects of my life.
I am most certainly being stretched and tested. While there are moments I literally want to crawl out of my own body and find a new one (one that has a firm handle on my imminent future), I have to remind myself that this is why I am here on this earth - to be stretched and tested. The disguises in which that comes is often surprising and strange and unexpected. But who I am to tell the universe how to manage its' affairs?
In the meantime, Monday - the day of reckoning - is just around the corner. I can make it until then. Heck, I have no choice. However, what I do with the time between now and then IS my choice. I get to define who I am in all of this. So I'll redirect my thoughts to only good things, keeping those trusty endorphins coursing through my veins with some good exercise, and continue to contribute positively at work despite wanting to hand in my notice RIGHT NOW. That I can control.
Maybe just intuitively implementing this gentle plan in the interim IS actually embracing delayed gratification in a more mature way. It's entirely possible I mistook this all to mean that those who really crack the notion of patience, have a great time along the way and thus don't feel the crawling out of their skin phenomenon as I have. As I'm mulling it over now, I'm not so sure that's true. Maybe those "masters" do in fact want to jump off a bridge but have found their own, gorgeous brand of "self-soothing" in order to cope with all the waiting. I am happy to now have some sort of game plan in place, and optimistic that I am on my way to joining the ranks of virtuous patience like the rest of you adults.
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