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Can we hurry patiently?
Patience is an ever present alternative to the mind’s endemic restlessness and impatience. Scratch the surface of impatience and what you will find lying beneath it, subtly or not so subtly, is anger. It’s the strong energy of not wanting things to be the way they are and blaming someone (often yourself) or some thing for it. This doesn’t mean you can’t hurry when you have to. It is possible even to hurry patiently, mindfully, moving fast because you have chosen to. ~ Jon Kabat-Zinn
Source:”Wherever You Go There You Are”
Just be patient, we say.
Wait your turn, we admonish.
Don’t be in such a hurry, we caution.
But how much time do we really have? Isn’t it always ticking down? Shouldn’t we move with a bit more urgency?
Or should we sit back with assurance? All will be well if we let it. No rush. Everything turns out in the end. If we’re patient.
“Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” ~ Matthew 11: 29-30
But rest isn’t a place we land accidentally. (Oh, look at that! I was resting and I didn’t even know it!… Don’t think so.)
Nor is rest a place we can run to. (Chest heaving from outracing her pursuer, she rested comfortably and drifted off to sleep. …Not!)
Rest is a condition. It’s a place we land when we adopt patience, whether by force of circumstance or by force of will. It’s a choice, not a giving in but a giving up of our own concerns for things in favor of a greater thing.
Rest is a state of being. We don’t just settle into it but we decide to employ it. It’s a weapon in our arsenal. A tool at our disposal. But first…
“Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” ~ Matthew 11:28
Let us hurry to patience. Rest waits for us there.
The Hurrieder I go, the Behinder I get
The hurrieder I go, the behinder I get.
That phrase, from a poster on my high school bedroom wall, is haunting me today. Not because time has passed, but because it hasn’t seemed to. It’s even more true today than it was back then, and it has me wondering whether I am making any headway.
Speed breeds errors. Which mean do-overs. Which take time. Which I have to take from something else I need to be doing. Which is on my mind as I rush to do again what I rushed through the first time.
Does this bother anyone else?
Slow down and get it right the first time beats like a drum in my daily doing. But slow doesn’t do it. Slow falls behind. Slow blows your doors off as they pass on the left and on the right. Slow, but sure, wins the race is for tortoises, not for today.
Somehow the quality of my living has to match the demands of the daily, but without do-overs. I don’t have any right to insist the other slow down so I can catch up. We all have the same twenty four hours to do the will of the One who sent us. I just need to get it righter, so I don’t get behinder. As the rush of wind circles back to pick up what it dropped, I will catch up.
What if my new poster is…
If God is in the race then God is in the pace.
How would Jesus run? I’m thinking He’d be a little bit like American Pharoah – but without the typo.
- He’d be cool and collected in the starting blocks.
- He wouldn’t burst into the lead right from the start.
- He’d vary his racing strategy to suit the competitors.
- He would trust His preparation and apply it through each turn and straight-away.
- He’d always have a finishing kick.
- He’d compete at all distances and
- win every race.
My preparation is on-going even as I am running this race. I needn’t concern myself with trouncing the other competitors, but I do need to tap all the energy stores, exert myself responsibly and when the time is right, count on my finishing kick.
This race has already been won, folks. There’s no hurry.
At just the right time…
At just the right time, you brought the world into existence, so why am I in such a hurry to speed things up?
The Kinesthetic Christian 