In the Western/US culture in which I live, we are impatient. We do not like being in the space between what was and what is to come. Sitting in the Irish mist, I call it, because it reminds me of time spent in Ireland when I could not see around the next curve in the road or in my life; those time after something has ended and before the next begins. We want it now and we want to know the whole picture, not just the beginning. But life is full of those spaces between here and there, and seldom are we shown the second step until we actually take a first one, which we are only shown after patiently spending time in quiet of the mist.
“When we last spoke, you suggested I read poetry,” a friend writes. “It reminded me of our talk about the Irish mist.” I beg you, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke Letters to a Young Poet
Rilke’s words speak elegantly to spending time in the Irish mist, moments of needed reflection that help us let go of that which was and grow into that which is to come. Where I live, in a rural wooded area, patience comes easier for me than it used to when I lived in the city. Perhaps it’s age as well that allows me to sit quietly and watch the morning mist rise from the farm fields on the other side of the trees, still bare from winter’s winds. Perhaps even, it’s a bit of wisdom that allows me to reflect on that which was, to heal and clear my wounds and un-attach from life’s past joys, so when the time is right, I can move into the next phase of my life, allowing the next creation to unfold in Divine time. If we are able to do this—allowing our lives to unfold naturally rather than pushing at them—that which comes is ready for us, as we are ready for it, created by our dreams and built by our patience.