Wait Without Thought


“I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope

For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,

For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith

But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.

Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:

So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.”

—T. S. Eliot, from “East Coker”


Just like last year, where I couldn’t find the words, Eliot speaks them for me. 2013 was the year of waiting, and that waiting has not ended with 2013. See, I always thought I was good at waiting. Out of sight out of mind, right? Not so much. I’ve discovered waiting bleeds me, like a silent, gradual vampirism.

I feel drained. I feel tired. And I feel like I’ve made no progress in the waiting of 2013.

This is a lie of course. The easy lie of adversative conjunctions. Small words that sow creeping, strangling doubt.

Yet…

I feel I accomplished nothing with my writing in 2013. Despite the fact that I completed four months of research, the first draft of a novel, and two revisions of said novel. I wrote flash fiction, banked new project ideas, beta’d some amazing short stories and novels for other author friends, and started a short story I’m pretty excited about. And yet… I don’t feel like I’ve done anything.

But…

Adversative conjunctions are dangerous words, insidious. They spin accomplishment into failure. I wrote a novel, but I haven’t blogged since February. I read twenty-seven books, but I haven’t read [insert anything from my 200+ book queue]. I spent time with family and friends, but… but… but… No matter what comes before, those three letters erase it all as inconsequential, worthless. Not good enough.

However…

Not all adversative conjunctions need cut us off at the knees. I want to look forward to 2014, to the waiting yet to come, not as a leeching stagnancy, but as the place to find the dancing within the stillness. I want to do, to be, to make free from addendum.

In 2013, I wrote, and I read.

In 2013, I mourned, and I celebrated.

In 2013, I lived, and I loved.

In 2013, I wrote a novel; I revised a novel.

In 2014, I will do these all again and, perhaps, end some waiting.

Things are changing, and I hope to have more than a few updates in the coming months. So, I’m going to keep working, and I’m not going to stop using adversative conjunctions, but I am going to steer them away from self-condemnation. That’s my resolution for 2014. Write more. Write better. Period.

Thanks for sticking with me, gentle readers.

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