Thursday, July 5, 2018

LET IT BEGIN WITH ME


7.5.18

Recently I had to get my blood drawn at a neighborhood lab office.  I arrived shortly after 8AM, signed the clipboard and seated myself in the waiting room among perhaps a dozen other people.  I opened the book I’d brought and began to read. 

Within moments I found myself distracted by jabs of uncomfortable feelings, and raised my eyes to survey the room.  I noticed my companions shifting impatiently in their chairs, the room tense with an undercurrent of barely repressed anger.  I heard the receptionist telling a client one of the staff had called in sick and that the computer kept freezing up. These remarks sent an eddy of deeper disgruntlement through the waiting room. 

Person after person continued to arrive until the chairs were full and people were standing.  The anger and frustration became more apparent, and I found them welling up in myself.  I felt angry at the universe for my situation; for having to come here on a day when everything was in chaos.  A mother and teenage son arrived for their appointment and were escorted back to the nurses immediately. The waiting room crackled with murmurs of annoyance.  I recalled that I could have made an appointment to bypass waiting, but the first appointment time had been 9:00, and I’d hoped to be gone by then. 

The anger grew more and more palpable. I hated being in that waiting room. I hated the feelings rising up in me. I contemplated getting up and leaving, knowing I’d have to come back another day and endure it all again.

And then… I realized… I had a choice. I could continue in this misery or I could accept the situation and reach deeper into myself to find peace. 

The suffering was so uncomfortable, I let it go.  I remembered that we come into this life to help one another through the lessons of life on earth, and I was currently contributing to the problem.

I let go of my choice to take the situation personally and be offended by it.  It took a minute to let go - my ego was very invested in being offended.  And then, it became apparent that this was a chance to offer something different.  If I could be so affected by the anger all around me, then others could be affected by acceptance and patience in me.  I sat back and let the acceptance wash over me, felt the patience and calm deep in my center, and let my tensed body language relax. 

In the 20 minutes or so that I continued to wait, as peace mixed with the anger in the room, the atmosphere began to change.  When I was finally called and offered up my arm to a harried nurse in blue scrubs, she said, “Thank you for not being angry.”  I realized that she’d been on the receiving end of the waiting-room energy.  And I was grateful that for at least one person, my peace had made a difference.


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