dor·mant

1 : represented on a coat of arms in a lying position with the head on the forepaws
2 : marked by a suspension of activity: as a : temporarily devoid of external activity b : temporarily in abeyance yet capable of being activated
3 b : having the faculties suspended c : having biological activity suspended: as : being in a state of suspended animation

Another word could be biding. It is a strange existence to be waiting for something. To be always in the present, unable to move forward. It kind of feels like not existing at all.

My entire life has been focused around finding a job for the past two weeks. I have hardly thought of anything else. Except for the time I spent shopping online for things I could maybe buy as soon as I got a job. I hate to admit it, but I have wasted these two weeks.

I have been a prodigal...which, if you are like me, you thought meant lost or rebellious or something like that. Turns out, calling him the prodigal son was in reference to something else about him:
1 : characterized by profuse or wasteful expenditure : LAVISH
2 : recklessly spendthrift
3 : yielding abundantly : LUXURIANT

This is something I have very recently been convicted of. This is why I was determined to learn some discipline. I guess I need to try again.

I want so badly to be useful, to have meaning and purpose. And not just any purpose, but to do something that will really be a contribution. And I am beginning to think that God is calling that meaning and purpose to be, if nothing else, to sit at His feet. Which doesn't often feel like much of a contribution, unfortunately. It is becoming much more apparent to me that God is less concerned with my being productive and contributive toward the forwarding of the Kingdom than He is with me just being in awe and wonder of who He is, the times when I wait for Him. The whole Martha and Mary thing. It is a hard balance to find between "take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light" and "from those who have been given much, much will be expected." I thought doing outreach ministry as my full-time job would automatically satisfy all of these things. Well, I might not have thought this explicitly, but I think it was sort of always in the back of my mind. It seemed so much more worthy, so much more vital than decorating cakes. And it made it a lot easier to justify being selfish all of the rest of the time.

For instance, it made it much easier to spend whatever money I may have had access to on whatever I wanted, since, after all, I was assured what I was making was in no way excessive. I find myself doing this thing where I have certain expectations for what I need to give, whether time or money or whatever, and as soon as I feel I have met my quota, the rest of what I have is mine to do with whatever I want. But that isn't sacrifice. And it doesn't often include an ambiguous number of hours for sitting at the feet of the Master.

People always talk about this crazy shift that happens when you go from being single to being married, and then to having kids. How you lose your freedom, you learn to be less selfish. Maybe it shouldn't be such an adjustment. Maybe we should learn to give of ourselves better when we are single and we have the freedom to do that in a lot of different ways. Maybe if we, as single people, could learn how to share our selves with others, to forget this idea that our time and our money and our energy are ours, perhaps we would be less inclined to not want to be single, or to be in this posture of waiting for our singleness to be done. (Not that any of us ever do that...)