It’s Not Your Turn
Confession: I went to church twice today.
I know. It might be getting out of hand. But here’s the thing. I went this morning for choir and that is a wonderful, fantastic thing…but it’s also become a little job-like. I love jobs, don’t get me wrong. But I sometimes find it hard to seek out my spiritual center when I’m trying to remember if we’re breathing on the 8th or the quarter, if ya know what I mean.
So this evening, I went to Loyola to just be there. Not sing in the choir. Not be in charge of anything. Just go and listen and think about this past week that was horrendous but very valuable in terms of lessons learned. In some ways I needed to give a little thanks…that things had moved in the directions in which they were intended. In others, I needed some guidance. I always need guidance. And here’s what I heard: “Wait. It’s Not Your Turn.”
It shocked me how much I’ve lost touch with the idea that 1) I don’t always get what I want right now and 2) that other people, rightfully, might get there first and that’s okay. They’ve earned it. There’s a funny reality about the confluence of doing graduate work and living alone. It can be a black hole of humanity. That sounds very melodramatic but I’m serious; I can go for literally weeks and not see more than a handful of people if I don’t work at it. What this means is lots of time focused on me in my own little world.
In some ways, I’ve never been more relieved to hear it’s not my turn…mostly because it implies there are others around me…that I’m part of a bigger picture because, honestly, that truth can really get lost in this type of life. Writing, thinking, writing, not eating, thinking, writing. I haven’t even been watching tv…
Thank God it’s not my turn. I forget, in the midst of everything else, that I don’t always have to fight for my turn, hold my place in line, argue for my point of view. I can let those things go every now and then and know that it’s not my turn and that things have to transpire before it will be my turn. This is the craziest sigh of relief I’ve ever taken.
It’s not my turn. It’s not my time. For some things. If I need to wait, I can let them go and just hope that I don’t lose that little paper number when it comes time that it’s called. Everything in it’s time. Everything.