A great secret is that we can never be disappointed when we are truly waiting. In that kind of open expectancy, in which we drop all of our demands that life turn the way we want, there is a natural fulfillment. We are the most unhappy with our lives, the most negative, when we are the most full of ourselves. There is no open expectancy in a demanding negative state; there is only blame, regret, frustration, and disappointment.

We have within us a higher nature that is created to wait upon the presence of God. Our ability to practice the presence of God becomes effortless in proportion to our willingness to see that we have not been able to make ourselves happy and whole through what we have given to ourselves. Proper waiting, proper awareness, allows us to be in a full, open relationship with what is being revealed to us in the moment. We want to start seeing the correlation between the amount of pain we are in and the number of demands we place upon the moment.

At anytime we can come back to ourselves, come back to the present moment, and wait openly. We are naturally open to the warmth of the sun on a perfect summer day; we expectantly wait upon the sun to touch us, placing no demands upon it. What our hearts really want is to drink fully from the present moment as it is, but we cannot drink from the moment if our cup is already full. True participation in the moment requires that the cup be empty. When we don't fill the moment with ourselves, we participate in it in a whole new way.