what is now

“I have always, essentially, been waiting. Waiting to become something else, waiting to be that person I always thought I was on the verge of becoming, waiting for that life I thought I would have. In my head, I was always one step away. In high school, I was biding my time until I could become the college version of myself, the one my mind could see so clearly. In college, the post-college “adult” person was always looming in front of me, smarter, stronger, more organized. Then the married person, then the person I’d become when we have kids. For twenty years, literally, I have waited to become the thin version of myself, because that’s when life will really begin….

And through all that waiting, here I am. My life is passing, day by day, and I am waiting for it to start. I am waiting for that time, that person, that event when my life will finally begin….

But this is what I’m finding, in glimpses and flashes: this is it. This is it, in the best possible way. That thing I’m waiting for, that adventure, that move-score-worthy experience unfolding gracefully. This is it. Normal, daily life ticking by on our streets and sidewalks, in our houses and apartments, in our beds and at our dinner tables, in our dreams and prayers and fights and secrets – this pedestrian life is the most precious thing any of use will ever experience.”

                                                                            Shauna Niequist, Cold Tangerines

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What are you waiting for?

Trump to implement his vision of America

Trump to collapse, to fall?

The Stock market to soar

The Stock market to collapse

What are you waiting for?

Power

Fame

Wealth

Or perhaps more altruistic things

Justice?

Equity?

The Kingdom of God?

The thing is, waiting is a way of denying

Denying the moment

Denying the person, the gift, the beauty

Right in front of you

We get so busy looking we do not see

So busy straining into the future that we are alienated from “now”

We keep chasing the person we think we want to be

And never accept or affirm the person that is

The beautiful disaster

That we are in this moment

I will never be perfect!

I know, it is a shock to me too

I will not do every class well

I will not be liked by everyone who knows me

I will not be deemed handsome or sexy by all

There will be days I alienate people

When I fail

Miserably

I cannot wait to become

Because I already am

This is me

This is what you get

Yes I can work to grow, to improve

I can work to be the best I can be

But I can only work out that salvation in this moment

The challenge for this day

Is to be, in the moment

To rejoice, in the moment

To see, in the moment, the beauty around me

There is a sun out there

A mountain out there

There are trees, and birds

And cows and calves

The world is stuffed with God

Stuffed with beauty

I tis time to quite waiting for what is next

And to grab hold of

And savor

What

Is

Now