Hurry Up and Wait

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"All human wisdom is summed up in two words; wait and hope." —Alexandre Dumas

As I approach my 40^th year in the mental health field I’ve been reflecting on the variety of techniques that I’ve encountered along the way. From Primal Scream, Gestalt, Psychodynamic, and Aversion, to Biofeedback, Exposure, Regression and countless others, they all promised the alleviation of suffering. I was encouraged to add these tools to my therapeutic toolkit and offer them when there was a match between the client’s needs and desired effect.

While the methods employed varied greatly, the common factor was to give the person who had come for healing something to do to bring about the sought-after result. It felt professionally rewarding to have clients leave sessions with some tangible skill to practice on the days between sessions. The glow of having achieved progress in diminishing someone’s anxiety, depression, etc. was often short-lived, as the follow-up session often began with, “That didn’t work, what else do you have?”

It was not until later in my career that I realized that the need to have a technique at the ready was often a band-aid approach and countertherapeutic. The urge to speed up the healing process gave the unintended message that the client was incapable of handling the pain. This avoidance had the potential of the client missing an important message that had arrived in the form of suffering.

Since this realization, I’ve often been reminded of the advice that the poet Rilke gave to a young poet experiencing emotional turmoil, “Why do you want to shut out of your life any uneasiness, any misery, any depression, since after all you don’t know what work these conditions are doing inside you? You must be patient like someone who is sick, and confident like someone who is recovering; for perhaps you are both. And more: you are also the doctor, who has to watch over himself. But in every sickness there are many days when the doctor can do nothing but wait.”

The reason the “waiting cure” does not top the list of “helpful things to say to clients” is that people experiencing high levels of inner-tension, understandably, seldom have patience to use it as a “go-to” technique. Unfortunately, when the therapist joins in on the impatience, opportunities for insights and new avenues for healing may be missed.

To counter the “What was I thinking” self-criticism, it occurred to me that the introduction of techniques and modalities have a purpose even if they fail. The sagely wisdom of therapeutic homework assignments give clients a sense of control and the wherewithal to endure the waiting period while the supportive nature of a therapeutic alliance allows the person’s natural recovery mechanisms to do their work. They are the psychological crutches necessary to allow time to heal the inevitable emotional bumps, bruises, and breaks life dishes out.

Interestingly, the word waiting means “to watch over” or simply “watch.” The word patience derives from Latin, patientem, meaning, "bearing, supporting, suffering, enduring, and permitting.” To put a fine point on it: to be “patiently waiting” is to watch our suffering. No wonder we don’t want to get good at it. Fortunately, the observing of the human condition is the very core of meditative practices and opens the door to the transformation of these otherwise exhaustive experiences.

The author Paulo Coelho wrote, “Life was always a matter of waiting for the right moment to act.” The trick is to be alert enough to see the moment when it arrives—to be mindfully present. In this way, waiting becomes an active process where one participates fully in the unfolding of life. Thus, the prayer, “God give me patience and give it to me now!” becomes, “Hurry up and wait!”

Here are some tips for turning waiting into a process of growth rather than decay:

1. When frustration builds due to prolonged periods of delay, practice the mantra, “Watching not waiting, watching not waiting.”
2. Turn the time-honored advice, “Don’t hold your breath,” into the meditative practice of counting your breaths when life hits the pause button.
3. Realize that it’s the time-addicted mind that counts days, hours, and minutes and that timelessness is discovered when we slow down.
4. Repeat as needed John Milton’s famous line, "They also serve who only stand and wait.”
5. Throw a “waiting party” where everyone sits around doing nothing and take bets as to who leaves first.

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Once the frustration factor that is the reflexive response to time turning against us is removed, an ease enters into one’s life where everything happens in its own time and the healing power of patience is revealed.