Learning to Wait Again

Series: Unravelling and Reweaving

I have never liked waiting. Not for news, not for answers, not for anything that holds the power to change life as I know it. But some of the most defining moments of my life have been spent doing exactly that, waiting.

When I applied for my visa to move to Germany in the middle of Covid, the world was on pause. Borders closed. Flights cancelled. Embassies silent. I remember checking my email each morning, half expecting something to appear, half dreading another day of nothing. The weeks blurred. There was no way to plan, no certainty that the move would even happen.

I filled the days with distractions. Paperwork. Cleaning. Cooking. Anything to make the hours feel used. But under all of that was a low hum of anxiety, a constant question: What if this never comes?

Waiting has a strange way of stretching time. One day can feel like a month, yet months can vanish overnight. You live suspended between what was and what might be, unable to move forward, yet unable to stay still.

It is hard not to treat waiting as wasted time. We are told that progress looks like action. That standing still means falling behind. But waiting can also be a different kind of movement, one that happens inside.

When you wait long enough, the noise quietens. You start to notice small things again, the sound of a kettle, the softness of light on the wall, the way your breath slows when you stop trying to rush it.

That first visa came through months later, long after I had stopped refreshing my inbox every hour. It arrived suddenly, as if no time had passed at all. Within weeks, I had packed up my life and was standing in a new country, looking out at streets I had only ever seen on Google Maps.

And now, years later, I find myself waiting again. Another visa. Another round of paperwork. Different details, same uncertainty. You would think that having done this before, I would know how to stay calm. But patience does not come once and stay. You have to keep relearning it.

Waiting is not about getting good at stillness. It is about remembering that life does not stop while you wait. I still catch myself thinking, I will relax when this is done or I will start living once this is over. But the truth is, this is it. This moment is life. The waiting is life too.

There are days when I can feel that truth. The sun breaks through, the air feels light, and I can say, yes, I am still moving even if I cannot see it. Then there are days when fear creeps back in, what if it all falls apart, what if time runs out, what if I am left behind?

It is not easy to hold peace in one hand and fear in the other. But I have learned that I do not need to choose between them. Both can belong. Both are part of what it means to wait and still live.

Looking back, I see how many good things have grown during those in-between times. Friendships formed when life was quiet. Moments with my children that I might have missed if the pace had been faster. Learning to cook a meal slowly instead of rushing through it. These are the pieces of life that do not announce themselves but hold you steady while everything else feels uncertain.

Maybe that is what waiting really gives us, the reminder that not everything can be forced, and not everything should be.

When life pauses, it is not asking you to fix it. It is asking you to notice it.

I used to think waiting was the opposite of progress. Now I see it as a teacher.

Every time I wait, something in me gets rearranged. My need for control softens. My awareness sharpens. I stop trying to predict the future and begin to pay attention to what is right in front of me.

Still, I do not pretend it feels easy. The waiting game tests every bit of me that likes answers and direction. There are nights I lie awake, watching the ceiling, my thoughts racing through a hundred scenarios. My mind insists that if I just think hard enough, I will find a way to make it move faster. But waiting laughs gently at that illusion.

It teaches you the limits of your own willpower. Not to humiliate you, but to remind you that control is not the same as peace.

Each time I go through a long season of waiting, I notice how it exposes what I worship. Not in the religious sense, but in the way we all build our lives around something we trust. For some, it is stability. For others, approval. For me, it was certainty.

When certainty disappears, you find out what holds you. And sometimes, what holds you is not what you thought.

I have come to see waiting as a slow kind of faith. Not faith in an outcome, but faith in the process of being shaped by time. The very act of waiting becomes sacred because it invites humility.

In those months of visa uncertainty, I realised how easy it is to treat time like an enemy. But time is not the problem. Our fear of wasted life is.

Now I try to mark waiting differently. I light a candle in the evening, not as a ritual, but as a sign to myself that today mattered, even if nothing happened. I write a few words about what I noticed, what I felt grateful for, even what hurt. I cook dinner. These small acts do not erase uncertainty, but they root me in what is real.

The waiting still stretches me. I still want to know what is next. But I have stopped asking for speed. I ask for steadiness instead.

Maybe that is what growing older teaches you, that the question is no longer “How long will this take?” but “How will I live while I wait?”

To anyone caught in that in-between, whether waiting for a visa, a diagnosis, a decision, or a new chapter, please do not rush yourself through the middle. The middle is where strength forms quietly.

You do not need to earn the next season by exhausting yourself in this one.

You can rest, move gently, laugh, breathe, and still arrive.

I remind myself of this daily. Even now, as I wait again.

The other night I sat by the window, watching the lights outside blur in the drizzle. For a moment, I caught myself thinking about how far I have come since that first long wait during Covid. I smiled, not because I had mastered patience, but because I finally understood what it was teaching me: life has never been about control. It has always been about presence.

So I keep living. I keep waiting. I keep noticing.

Because one day, the email will come. The door will open. The thing I am waiting for will finally arrive. And I will be grateful that I did not waste the waiting.

If you find yourself in that same pause, I would be honoured to walk with you.

Through Bravely Me Coaching, I help people rediscover purpose and calm while navigating uncertainty, transition, or change.

You do not have to rush to the next chapter. Together, we can make meaning in the space between.

Find out more at www.bravelyme.eu/coaching