Active waiting means present fully to the moment, in the conviction that something is happening where you are and that you want to be present to it.
Interpretation
Active waiting encourages mindfulness and being fully present in the moment, believing that meaningful experiences are occurring around you.
In this quote, Henri Nouwen highlights the concept of 'active waiting' as a crucial practice in our lives. It suggests that rather than passively waiting for events to unfold, we should engage fully with the present moment, trusting that valuable experiences are always happening. This approach fosters a deeper connection to our surroundings and enhances our awareness, allowing us to appreciate life as it occurs rather than merely anticipating the future.
In practice
In a meditation class discussing the importance of mindfulness.
The Christian leader of the future is called to be completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing to offer but his or her own vulnerable self. God loves us, not because of what we do or accomplish, but because God has created and redeemed us in love.
The immense joy in welcoming back the lost son hides in the immense sorrow that has gone before....our brokenness may appear beautiful, but our brokenness has no other beauty but the beauty that comes from the compassion that surrounds it.
Suffering invites us to place our hurts in larger hands. In Christ we see God suffering β for us. And calling us to share in Godβs suffering love for a hurting world. The small and even overpowering pains of our lives are intimately connected with the greater pains of Christ. Our daily sorrows are anchored in a greater sorrow and therefore a larger hope.
To listen is very hard, because it asks of us so much interior stability that we no longer need to prove ourselves by speeches, arguments, statements or declarations. True listeners no longer have an inner need to make their presence known. They are free to receive, welcome, to accept.
Waiting is a dry desert between where we are and where we want to be. (Finding My Way Home)
Becoming the beloved is pulling the truth revealed to me from above down into the ordinariness of what I am, in fact, thinking of, talking about and doing from hour to hour.
Half of your power lies in your sameness with others. The other half lies in your uniqueness.
A man who wills commands something within himself that renders obedience, or that he believes renders obedience.
We suffer much agony because we try to get from people what only God can give us, which is a sense of worth and value. Look to God for what you need, not to people.
Feel the energy of your inner body. Immediately mental noise slows down or ceases. Feel it in your hands, your feet, your abdomen, your chest. Feel the life that you are, the life that animates the body. The body then becomes a doorway, so to speak, into a deeper sense of aliveness underneath the fluctuating emotions and underneath your thinking.
I sometimes still go out hunting for bad weather, flying low in simple airplanes to explore the inner reaches of the clouds. Less experienced pilots occasionally join me, not to learn formal lessons about weather flying, but with a more advanced purpose in mind - to accompany me in the slow accumulation of experience through circumstances that never repeat in a place that defies mastery.
Trust the people -- that is the crucial lesson of history.
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