Patience...

I am becoming keenly aware that life has a funny way of making sure you really understand a lesson before you move on from it. My current lesson is patience. This is what I have focused on the past few days: being patient in the here and now . . . no matter what the circumstance. I am in a stage in life where there is so much I want to be different, whether it is simply healing from this nagging cough I've had for over two weeks, or as important as the complete healing of past hurts in a relationship. I am learning that being patient through the process is part of what brings us the outcome.

When our bodies are sick, in order to be well, we must promote healing with rest, nourishment, sometimes medicine. When we are wanting a specific outcome or result in a situation, we must also get comfortable with the process. We must do good work in the interim, learning how to be the person we need to be in order to be successful with that intended result. Otherwise we will be incapable of flourishing in the new because we failed to learn what we needed to move away from the old. We can get so hell-bent on wanting what we think we deserve, what we think we need, that we forget to recognize what it is life is trying to teach us in order to give us that want or need. We must take the opportunity to be patient and focus on what is required to transform us from this to that.

So in life's amazing way of helping us to really see what it is that we are missing, sometimes you just get dealt the right card. In my case it was the "patience" card, literally, in my Osho Zen Tarot Deck. Bam! Life said, "here, Cheryl, let me just write it out for you verbatim." The following is an excerpt from the commentary:

". . . now is a time when all that is required is to be simply alert, patient, waiting. 

We have forgotten how to wait; it is almost an abandoned space. And it is our greatest treasure to be able to wait for the right moment. The whole existence waits for the right moment. Even trees know it-- when it is time to bring the flowers and when it is time to let go of all the leaves and stand naked against the sky. They are still beautiful in that nakedness, waiting for the new foliage with a great trust that the old has gone, and the new will soon be coming . . .

We have forgotten to wait, we want everything in a hurry. It is a great loss to humanity . . . In silence and waiting something inside you goes on growing -- your authentic being. And one day it jumps and becomes a flame, and your whole personality is shattered; you are a new man."

I am challenging myself to be patient and learn what it is that I've missed in order to move from where I no longer wish to be to the greatness that is ahead. I am challenging myself to not be in a hurry to get there but to spend the time, to be thankful for the time, to grow and acquire and transform completely. I'm not ready yet for what is not in the now. My present is perfect even without the results I am looking forward to in the future. This is a beautiful time...