This past Sunday, I found myself anxious for the service to start. At 10:30 a couple of people were still walking in from the parking lot. I wanted the Lay Leader to begin, because it was 10:30, darn it! But then I looked at her, and her face and body were relaxed as she calmly waited for two more participants to arrive. I decided to take a couple of deep breaths, center myself, and let go of my impatience. For me, that's progress. On the flip side, it never bothers me for the service to take as long as it takes. I'm there for the experience.
Love this. I have anxiety issues around lateness also due to my family of origin. This is spot on. And if it matters--it came at the perfect time for me today, when I didn't have the morning rush of e-mails to get through.
As a person who struggles with time as a concept, and with timeliness as the cishet white culture understands it, I appreciate this. I have tried (and been held accountable for) to move toward clock-time expectations my whole life, and by laboriously calculating backwards from the expected start time or due date I can come… darn close. But rarely have the clock time people made an effort to move toward my event time/spirit time reality. So thank you for giving yourself permission to be more flexible about time.
And when I thought, Hey it’s Wednesday! A new Hold My Chalice comes today! And there wasn’t one, my first thought was “it is still morning. There’s a lot of Wednesday left.” And sure enough, later on Wednesday, there it was!
I think we had the same parents!! The recent hurricanes in Florida has made everything off kilter-- road closures due to flooding or fallen trees, power outages, all have contributed to later starts to meetings and other gatherings. It was a reminder to me to slow down, not be in a rush all the time, and go with the flow instead of being anxious about that two minute late start.
This past Sunday, I found myself anxious for the service to start. At 10:30 a couple of people were still walking in from the parking lot. I wanted the Lay Leader to begin, because it was 10:30, darn it! But then I looked at her, and her face and body were relaxed as she calmly waited for two more participants to arrive. I decided to take a couple of deep breaths, center myself, and let go of my impatience. For me, that's progress. On the flip side, it never bothers me for the service to take as long as it takes. I'm there for the experience.
Love this. I have anxiety issues around lateness also due to my family of origin. This is spot on. And if it matters--it came at the perfect time for me today, when I didn't have the morning rush of e-mails to get through.
As a person who struggles with time as a concept, and with timeliness as the cishet white culture understands it, I appreciate this. I have tried (and been held accountable for) to move toward clock-time expectations my whole life, and by laboriously calculating backwards from the expected start time or due date I can come… darn close. But rarely have the clock time people made an effort to move toward my event time/spirit time reality. So thank you for giving yourself permission to be more flexible about time.
And when I thought, Hey it’s Wednesday! A new Hold My Chalice comes today! And there wasn’t one, my first thought was “it is still morning. There’s a lot of Wednesday left.” And sure enough, later on Wednesday, there it was!
I think we had the same parents!! The recent hurricanes in Florida has made everything off kilter-- road closures due to flooding or fallen trees, power outages, all have contributed to later starts to meetings and other gatherings. It was a reminder to me to slow down, not be in a rush all the time, and go with the flow instead of being anxious about that two minute late start.