Last evening I was talking to a friend, telling her how I was feeling stuck.
It did not make sense, even to me, as I said it out loud. I am in a place that is gorgeous. Surrounded by trees, thick and green and alive. Squirrels and monkeys come and go as if they know me. A hawk circles sometimes. Kingfishers. A hummingbird — actually two of them once, right up close.
And still stuck.
She listened, and then she said something I did not expect.
Swati, you are the most hardworking person I know. You are involved and aware of everyone around you. So giving. A family person. An entrepreneur. Probably it is time for you to rest before you begin the next chapter of your life.
I did not have much to say back to that. It is still hard for me to just take that.
This morning
This morning, I looked out and saw this.
Just trees. Not a clear view of the sky, not a clean horizon, not anything I could call a destination. Just green, layered over green, branches crossing branches, everything a little blurred through the glass.
I sat with it for a while before I understood why it felt like an answer.
And then I saw it. Half-hidden in the reflection, caught somewhere between the glass and the leaves — a door. Just there, standing in the middle of all that green, as if it had been waiting for me to notice it.
I have spent so long looking for the next thing: the next chapter, the next offering, the next step. Even here, in a place this abundant, some part of me was still scanning for whatever comes next.
But the trees were not doing that. The trees were simply trees. Full, tangled, unhurried, exactly where they were supposed to be. And the door was not asking to be walked through today. It was only asking to be seen.
What “Stuck” Actually Means Sometimes
I think we have decided that feeling stuck always means something is wrong. That it is a problem to solve, a knot to untangle, a sign that we are somehow falling behind.
But maybe, sometimes, being stuck is just tiredness asking for a different word.
I have been building so much. Maloka. The teaching. The writing. The podcast. All of it real, all of it meaningful, all of it mine. And somewhere in the building, I forgot that even the most beautiful forest needs a season where nothing new is growing. Where the trees are simply holding what they already have, gathering strength for whatever comes next.
My friend was right, and I did not want her to be.
Resting Before the Next Chapter
There is a particular kind of exhaustion that comes from being endlessly capable, from being the one who shows up for everyone else, who notices what everyone around you needs, who keeps going because stopping has never really felt like an option.
I am good at almost everything except this. Except sitting still long enough to admit that I am tired. And getting impatient with this whole scenario where I have to just wait it out.
But the window this morning did not show me a view to move toward. It showed me a wall of green, dense and unbothered, asking for nothing except to be looked at exactly as it is. And somewhere inside all of it, a door… simply there. Waiting.
Maybe that is what this season is. Not a stuck one, but a resting one. Not the absence of growth, but the work happening somewhere underground, out of sight, before anything new is ready to show itself.
Maybe I am in between seasons too. And maybe the door will still be there, exactly where I left it, when I am finally ready to walk through.
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