Oh, hi friends!
A follow-up from a job interview. Test results. Offers. Rejections. Opportunities extended or denied. Your own mind circling around a decision.
I’m convinced the waiting room is one of the least appealing places on earth — physically, mentally, or otherwise.
We love certainty! We love knowing.
You know what’s not fun? Not knowing!!!
This is playing out in, um, many places right now.
So I wonder, what’s the cure?
Actually, I’ll ask you: how do you cope during an unsettled time?
Do you do something small for yourself? Buy a little treat? Text a friend “today is a nightmare” for gentle commiseration? Do you refresh your inbox 16 times an hour? Do you seek out the concrete and settle for the squishy?
There is no one solution, I’ve found, except vacillating back and forth and back again through various ways of coping until you find the one that works for you, for this moment. Then when that no longer works, you move on to another.
Hiding your phone — in a cabinet, in a drawer, under the cat — that helps, too.
What do you do?
Waiting can be unsettling, especially when you focus on the fact that you're waiting for something or someone. But if instead it gets reframed as a 'time gift,' that can change the experience of impatience and uncertainty.
Your time is still your time. You just don't have all the pieces or answers at that particular moment.
When I'm in a waiting mode and am anxious about an outcome, I allow myself to feel those feelings for a while. Not a long time, but I don't stuff them away either.
Then I look at where I am right now. What do I need in that moment? It could be a change of environment, a walk by the river, or the woods. Maybe it's communication with a loved one, a call, text, email, or coffee. Perhaps it's meditating, journaling, or eating something on the 'eat infrequently treat list.' It could be tapping into my senses- noticing the temperature, watching the trees sway, hearing the birds chirping or buzzing of the leaf blowers, smelling the earthy scents of spring.
It could involve being proactive about something completely unrelated. Making progress on a project, getting caught up on things I want to attend to, organizing, editing, or clearing.
Or, I could do nothing. Because that's OK, too.
To be truthful, Kara, I don’t have one method for coping. But sometimes I find a movie, even though it is not on my schedule. This helps.