Sunday, November 28, 2010

waiting

I talked with my husband about the fact that I was so wound up the last few weeks and that I thought I needed to stop and just wait.  At first it came out sounding like "wait for you to catch up to me," which didn't sound right.  What I had meant was that I need to stop and wait to hear him before I go off and just assume or decide or do on my own.  I had been making decisions and pushing an agenda and striking out on my own quite a lot.   

Most people don't like to wait, I know I don't - it takes that active control of myself I had talked about.  And it is very much different to how I am used to being and doing.  So then there was an internal conversation with myself about whether and when he would want me waiting for him?  Waiting on him?  Big difference between the two - interesting that. 

[Yes - I see the obvious -  that my mind immediately took off on its own to figure it out, make some decisions for myself.  Not waiting!  I actually talked to him about that too.  At this point, I can work on controlling my words and my actions.  I'm not sure that I can or should try to direct what thoughts come to me or not, only how I act on them.  What I choose to do or say, and what I leave unsaid and not done, will influence what I learn and where my thoughts go from there.]
 
I thought about the various ways the word waiting is used.  The meaning I had been thinking of was the obvious "stop what you're doing and not act until some other thing comes to pass", or to just "bide your time."   But then there is the idea of ladies-in-waiting, waiters, waiting on people, as in serving them.  I suppose the point is that they do have to be still and bide their time, not act until requested or directed to do so.  Interesting that waiting in this context is synonymous with serving. 

It also occurred to me that there are major world religions which have a very large component of waiting - waiting for the fullfillment of a covenant, waiting for the second coming, etc...  So, waiting is having faith that the promise will be met.  But it is the structure of the relationship too.  And it is on some levels both the reason and the means by which honor is shown. 

Then I remembered a book I have always liked - a major theme of the story is that waiting is praying.  In this case, the characters were waiting to be able to be together, but there were tasks they each had to accomplish first, things they needed to learn - pretty cliche story line really.  The waiting as praying in this context though brought everything to an individual, personal relationship level.  It was not about a religion dictating a heirarchy of subservience.  It was about each person's faith and beliefs guiding his or her decisions and that being lived through their relationships. 

This is all awfully big and deep stuff considering it started with me thinking about much smaller, day-to-day stuff.  It's important too though.    But there are the fun aspects to waiting, or there are the more overtly  D/s uses of waiting.  Other people have written about it much better than I could. Mouse talks about being made to "be still".  Jz talked about the challenge of being open and vulnerable while waiting (here).  And Aisha wrote about the very erotic aspects of being made to wait (here).

Waiting, for me, means that I have to be quiet and still - I have to listen.  Acting means deciding and often means assuming something about what he wants.  By no means do we, or could we, live our lives if I waited for him to make every decision for me.  Life would come to a standstill and he would never even consider that: too much work for him, and a total waste of me.  But there are many opportunities for me to honor  him and serve him by waiting. 

7 comments:

  1. I think the day to day stuff is firmly rooted in the big stuff, tho', so it's important to bring them together and see them as the pieces of the puzzle that they are.

    Interesting ponder.
    (I may be spring-boarding...)
    :-)

    (nulfer)

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  2. I don't wait well. I am quick to jump and try to do things on my own. I often get my self in trouble because of this bad habit. I am also a bit ocd and that makes it worse.

    Learning to wait and be patient is the hardest lesson for me.

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  3. Jz,
    You are right of course, adn please - spring away.

    Aeon's Angel,
    Hi! It is a very tough change for me as well - especially balancing what i should wait and what i should take care of on my own. It's funny - my husband is the one who has those ocd traits - makes it even more useful for me to figure out "his way." Thanks.

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  4. Nice work! I like the way you used the "waiting in the sense of waiter or server" concept. That's a very active form of waiting. And waiting as prayer... very cool. Intereting stuff, glad you shared your thoughts!!

    hugs,

    aisha

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  5. Aisha,
    Thank you - don't know if it will help me do the waiting any better - but maybe, maybe if i see the connection to serving and realize it is a way to be active as well, just differently.

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  6. I find "waiting" hard. Especially if it is waiting for my wife who is exploring the shops! But in more serious situations too. There is an imperative for action. When one is troubled then doing something about it is taking control of the situation and it can relieve the stress.

    However perhaps that is from a Dom perspective and others respond very differently.

    What I have discovered though as I have grown older is that rather than rushing to intemperate action there is a real value in - I haven't called it waiting before but yes, waiting.

    I have perhaps thought of it as being still. When still one can watch the situation and others rushing around and come to a slower, more considered and perhaps even wiser course of action.

    I once had a very busy and stressful job. That together with a very difficult home situation led to a stress related illness. I learned then too the power of waiting - of being still.

    I can sometimes just sit. I have learned to relax. Some might call it meditation. It is a good skill to have. I try to teach it to my subs.

    So yes.

    Wait.

    Be still ...

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  7. Pygar,
    Thank you. I agree. I believe ther is value in knowing when to act and when to wait. This is universal, not unique to any group of people. It is like so much else: the locus of deciding is different at times between Doms and subs. Part of learning for me now is to know when to do this on my own.

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