Playing a perfectly imperfect waiting game

January has been a bit of a hibernation month for me. Not because I’ve been sleeping through it – although I’m sure some of us have fantasised about doing that at times! – but because I’m playing a bit of a prolonged waiting game at the moment. It’s not something I can share about at this stage, but hopefully soon…

I wrote about waiting last month, musing about how the human race has attempted to remove as much waiting from modern existence as we can, but there are still aspects of it that we simply can’t expunge from our reality. 

Waiting is not something that comes particularly naturally to me, and I’m pretty sure that’s true of most human beings.  Find me the hero who says that they actually enjoy waiting – I’d love to chat to them and find out more about what makes them tick!  So, in what follows, I’m going to give you my real-life, no-filters-here musings about how I’m doing my best to play a perfectly imperfect waiting game.

A game which embraces rather than fights against the reality that I can find waiting frustrating and difficult. A game which acknowledges that I’m a trauma survivor who has developed a deep mistrust and dislike of uncertainty, given my prolonged exposure to a more toxic form of it in the past. And a game which balances optimism that I can wait more healthily than I have done in the past with realism that I’m not a Zen master…!

Obviously, how far each of these thoughts applies to you will depend on the unique facets that make you gloriously you, and the particular circumstances of your personal waiting game. Mine involves waiting for something to come to fruition which is really important to and defining for me, which is not in my control, and which is taking longer than I had originally anticipated.

So, what have I learned? Here goes…

1. If you’re waiting for something that’s not in your control, find a way to let go of the outcome. After all, by its very nature, you can’t control it!  This is probably the hardest lesson of all, particularly if the thing you’re waiting for seriously matters to you. As a Christian, my way of doing this is to give the thing over to God, and ask to be looked after in the process. I’ve found it’s not enough simply to do this once – this is a repeated act of faith, trust and patience. The beliefs you hold will guide how the principle of letting go applies to you.

2. Look for helpful ways to occupy your time, balancing optimism with realism. I find it super helpful to have something to focus on, to keep me and my busy brain occupied. Yes, it is absolutely fantastic to still one’s mind with some form of meditation, but I’ve also needed to be realistic with myself that my brain – a bit like a toddler – needs activities at a time like this! I have done some business planning for 2024, and I’ve sketched out the outline of the new book I intend to write. But it has not felt like the right time to actually get writing – I’m just not in a suitable frame of mind for that right now, and it was helpful for me to admit that to myself. What I’ve primarily focused on instead are administrative business tasks, of which I had quite a few outstanding after my initial business set-up process last year. Not exciting, not glamorous – but necessary, and suitably complex that my brain has had a steady stream of stuff to chew on, to stop it ruminating too much about my waiting game.  Puzzles and jigsaws have also proved to be non-work-related forms of brain fodder!

3. Embrace living fully in the moment where you can!  One of the ultimate goals of many wellness frameworks is to live in the moment. Not stressing about the past (which we can’t change) and not worrying about the future (which we can’t control), but being absorbed by the present. Sounds great, but it can be easier said than done, particularly at more challenging times. I haven’t achieved this all the time during the past month by any stretch of the imagination, but I have found pockets of time where I have been able to immerse myself in the here and now. For example, last week we had a very unusual dumping of a large amount of snow here in NW Scotland, which lasted a few days. My husband and I wanted to be outside all the time, but he had work which needed his attention, so we were able just to snatch some time here and there during daylight hours to go out and have some fun. Even then, I had the shadow of my waiting game hanging over me, and I was concerned I wouldn’t be able to enjoy the snow. I found that success lay in taking a few deep breaths and gently reminding myself that nothing was likely to change in the next hour or two – so I might as well just go out there and have fun with my wonderful hubby. Which we did, and it was wonderful respite!  I loved the Snow Lady we built together!

On the flipside, though…

4. Don’t expect it to go swimmingly all the time. This is likely to lead to disappointment. We’re human, after all, and when we’re under stress, cracks are more likely to appear. A couple of days ago, for example, the hubby and I got frustrated about something and the beginnings of an argument flared up. Part of me wanted to stay annoyed, but another part desperately didn’t. Luckily, that latter part won out. Over the years, I’ve learned how to pause in moments like this, and just give the better part of me a chance to have a say over the din of whatever is happening. We made up quickly. That didn’t mean that we felt great – the wider impacts of the waiting game have been hard on both of us at times, and we felt low for a while. The key was not being upset at ourselves for not somehow being superhuman – it was ok for us to feel down, we didn’t have to add the weight of self-condemnation into the mix.

5. When things are tougher, find small ways to keep going hopefully. When things feel harder, sometimes all I want to do is give in. What I’ve found works for me is to engage in small acts of resistance. For me, this can include making the effort to go out for a walk, or cooking up some healthy food, or enjoying a TV programme. So, nothing heroic here, although making a more positive choice can absolutely feel heroic in a darker moment…

And finally…

6. Be kind to yourself. What being kind to yourself means can vary depending on the context. Sometimes, for example, some gentle self-discipline can be exactly what we need, and I’ve employed some of that in recent weeks. But more generally I’ve been a bit more relaxed and flexible with myself. Have I eaten a bit more chocolate than usual recently? Yup. I’m not talking truckloads, but certainly more than I would normally consider optimal! But it’s cheered me up, and that’s ok. And have I allowed myself to sleep in sometimes when I haven’t slept well? Again, yup. Normally, having a consistent sleep routine is very important for a chronic insomniac like me, but recently that hasn’t felt kind or tenable. I need rest when I can get it. The routine can and will be brought back in due course… Obviously there’s balance involved in all of this, and we have to avoid dangerous slippery slopes, but I find that a bit of flexibility is sometimes a good thing for me.

Overall, I’ve learned not to strive for perfection: but rather to play a perfectly imperfect waiting game by being realistic, gentle and kind with myself, whilst also finding ways to improve my waiting experience and learning what works for me!