Quantum Patience and Graceful Timing

Slow Down

I reinjured my eye this morning. Not badly enough to require another contact bandage (a small disappointment—I wanted some more of that medical magic), but sharply enough to give me pause.

See? When I stub a toe, slice a finger, or suffer any minor injury, I ask the universe, Why? What do I need to see or notice? (I might also shake my fist at the sky.) These small traumas land as messages: Slow down.

One of my daily asks is “quantum patience and graceful timing.” When these words first came to me, I resisted.

I’m already patient. Tolerant. Long suffering, some might say. Why would I ask for more, let alone quantum, patience?

But this patience isn’t about tolerating other people’s annoyances. Others are and will always be beyond my control. My ask is different. It’s perseverance. It’s the willingness to keep showing up, even when I’m stuck, to do the work even on days I’d rather sleep in or lose myself in social media and word games.

Quantum patience is faith in process. Trusting the muses and furies and the energies of the creative circles to spin just right. To dance together in perfect timing.

Graceful timing… quantum patience’s partner.

Lately, I feel the cusp, that edge. The new air that slips through a barely cracked door. Not wide open, but enough light, enough fresh to bolster my perseverance.

Google tells me over 80% of U.S. Americans long to write a novel. Many may be carrying one inside them. Most never put it on the page.

Writing a novel requires more than longing. It demands perseverance. It demands quantum patience—the willingness to return to the page day after day—and faith in graceful timing.

Showing Up

Many authors say the same thing:

• Madeleine L’Engle: Inspiration usually comes during work, rather than before it.
• Stephen King: Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.
• Elizabeth Gilbert: Don’t wait around to be inspired before you get to work, folks. You may be waiting a long time… show up and get to work

I do. I write alone every day, with others fourteen to twenty times a week. That’s the perseverance that quiets doubt. That’s the quantum patience that receives the graceful timing.

There is power in writing in the quiet of a Zoom room with other writers. An anchor. An act of centering. A creative community.

If you’d like to experience this, join me for Second Cup M/W/F at 8:30 CST. Here’s the link for February.

Second Cup was inspired and modeled after Sue Reynolds’ Pyjama Writing. You can find her weekly M-F writing sessions at 6:30 and 9:30 CST on her website.

These are all free of guilt and fee.

Recalibrating

And back to the reinjured eye.

This week, all the plans laid out for February, March, and April unraveled. Like the eye, the upheaval gave me pause. But the requisite scheduling gymnastics is not painful, just an annoyance. And a reminder: perseverance is not pushing.

I pushed hard at the start of the year to line things up the way I thought they should be. But the timing and my thinking were off.

I’m recalibrating, with patience, with perseverance.

I trust that graceful timing is not something I force. It’s something I meet.

©Pennie Nichols. All Rights Reserved. 2026