Rest

While I was at urgent care, even though there were absolutely NO other patients there, I had to do some waiting. And I was pretty bored. They didn't even have any good magazines with articles about Ali the Bachelorette. Just dumb medical magazines.

So I'd just gotten my wrist x-rayed and was sitting next to the x-ray machine while the nurse made sure the x-rays had all come out well, and emailed them to the guy who checks them. And before she left me to do that she said, "Now you get to just relax while I check your x-rays."

The phrase "get to" struck me. It wasn't an obligation to sit and be bored. It was an opportunity to rest.

I'm not very good at just resting. I like to always be doing SOMETHING. Even if it's restful, like reading or watching TV, I can't just sit there and rest. The skill seems to be conditioned out of us here in America.

And as I sat and waited for her, I thought about what it would be like if I could really just sit and rest and be OK with that. If I could see waiting as an opportunity to relax, not a boring time to be impatient. It seems like that would be a nice outlook.