On waiting....

Last night, my friend sent me this picture. This was the start of a long conversation about waiting for opportunities. Some of the opportunities are more long term, others are just opportunities that never present themselves despite your best efforts. Sometimes it just seems like fate never gives you a fair shot. It got me thinking though, why do we always have to wait?

If you think about it, nothing in life comes instantaneously. Waiting is just a part of the nature of the world. You wait for your next class, your new schedule, for a promotion at work, to meet that special someone, on and on the list goes. Nothing comes without a wait. Sometimes the wait is for nothing, and the events never turn out as you planned.

There is nothing more devastating than waiting for nothing. I am not a patient person, and the most difficult part of waiting is not the test of my patience, but rather hoping the end result is worth my time and effort. When it's not, it creates this downward spiral questioning why you waited and for what. It's a very counterproductive process when you think about it. To wait and wait and to reap no benefit out of waiting. The lack of benefit represents how things in life just didn't go our way.

I like to think that the waiting is worth it. I like to think that when you wait, you learn things through the trials. Maybe this is a cliche thought, but nothing in life comes easily, or without some patience. It's never easy, but if everything was just handed to you, what would you learn? Learn to ask and your requests are answered without work?

We're always waiting for something. Sometimes it's something menial in our day to day lives. Other things are long term. Often the things that we want the most seem the most impossible, and the farthest from our grasp. There's a reason we have to wait though. There are always other events that have to take place before the others can occur in the long term. It's a process that seems endless and worthless, but there's a hidden value that can only be seen when you realize the growth that has to occur in you as an individual before something greater can happen.

I hate waiting just as much as anyone else. I'm not patient. But everything is worth the wait....