Waiting is worth it

Reflections on waiting

Waiting is an enigma in our American culture. Our culture strives towards as short of wait times as possible through increasing the speed and efficiency of delivery systems, meticulous tracking to know when food or deliveries will be ready, and just an overall desire for visibility and the illusion of control. We are completely averse to waiting whether it is for something as simple as waiting in line at the grocery store checkout to something difficult like waiting for the end of a hard season.

When I talk with friends and family about the hard things going on in their lives the emphasis is often on how long the waiting will take as opposed to how the process of waiting is going. We all want the waiting to be over and done with. There are very few people I know who actually see value in the time waiting when that is their reality.

Photo by Michał Parzuchowski on Unsplash

I recently finished Waiting Isn't a Waste: The Surprising Comfort of Trusting God in the Uncertainties of Life by Mark Vroegop and this book was a huge kick in the pants for me. As mentioned in prior Substacks, I tend to rush through life and am very goal-oriented. Anything that comes in between me and my goal I tend to consider a problem and almost 100% of the time, I view waiting in this way. In the Introduction of the book, Vroegop explained his view of waiting before writing this book and how he saw no value in it and was instead focused on stewarding his time well and doing that through productivity and efficiency. He did not realize until later in life that he was wasting his waiting. His description of how he viewed waiting completely aligned with my view on waiting. The inefficiency of waiting drives me nuts and in the past I have not understood that waiting could provide any value besides learning to trust God in circumstances beyond my control.

Vroegop has six main points: waiting is hard, waiting is common, waiting is biblical, waiting is slow, waiting is commanded, and waiting is relational. Through these he helps to normalize that waiting is going to happen in this life and it will be hard. However, it is commanded by God that we wait, so we should prepare to wait and be intentional in that waiting. So much of waiting is realizing that we are not in control. We can choose to wait well and we can do that by waiting with others in community and talking about how we are waiting. Ultimately, “Waiting biblically is seeing seasons of delay as opportunities to hope in God.”

What stuck out to me most from Vroegop’s book was his ascribing importance and purpose to waiting. When something does not appear to have value, I quickly put it to the side because what is the point in pursuing it if it has no value? However, reframing waiting as something of value has really helped me grasp that there is a purpose to waiting and if I lean into it, it will be more efficient in the long run. In grad school, my boss always reminded me that every experiment that did not go well was adding up to one that would go well. The skills I learned through the experiments that did not work helped that one experiment work. I have also observed this in my pottery dabbling. Some days I go to the pottery studio and do not have anything to show for it, but I know that my mind and body are understanding the clay better through every pot I have to scrap. On other days, everything clicks and I am able to create some beautiful pieces. I believe that the pursuit of waiting will be similar to these two examples as I practice waiting well in smaller circumstances which will hopefully translate to waiting well in larger circumstances.

Last week, my husband and I were in the Netherlands for vacation and to see a Formula 1 race. It was incredible to get away and I really love Europe so it was doubly special to be on vacation together in a new place that we could explore. We had many opportunities to wait - through customs, for trains, for the race to start - the list goes on. As we were waiting for the metro one day, I was struck that this kind of waiting did not bother me because I was on vacation. Vacation was an opportunity to slow down and go with the flow of the moment. Inefficiency did not phase me like normal because I could take a break from being so concerned about efficiency. Honestly, this realization that I could take a break from the constant drive towards efficiency was very refreshing and has caused me to want to foster more of this kind of attitude at home.

My times of frustration with waiting often seem to be driven by the arbitrary schedule I have in my head and the voice of my inner critic saying that X needs to be done within a certain timeframe or that it even needs to occur in the first place. Letting go of any elements of my plan for the day is difficult and often makes me feel like the plan failed. But as Kendra Adachi who wrote the The Lazy Genius Way and hosts a fantastic podcast says, “Plans are not pass/fail” This is an important reminder for me to remember as it is easy to ascribe meaning and purpose to plans when they are not a reflection of me as a person. By letting go of my plans a bit more, I hope that I can wait better and not view waiting as a complete disruption of my plans, but as a way I can choose to use the waiting time well and grow.

At the end of his book, Vroegop encouraged that in our families, churches, and friend groups that instead of focusing so much on the waiting being over, we instead ask each other if we are waiting well and how we can do that. This is definitely something I want to incorporate in my relationships as we all are in periods of waiting for little or big things!