Limbo
Etymology
From Medieval Latin "limbus," "border, edge, hem." In Christian theology the limbus was the borderland of hell where certain souls — the unbaptized, or the righteous who died before Christ — waited without either torment or heaven. From that bordered waiting-place came the general sense of any suspended, unresolved state.
The dance called the limbo is unrelated — from Jamaican English, tied to "limber" (supple, flexible).
noun · /LIM-boh/
An in-between state of waiting, uncertainty, or suspension where nothing is resolved.
What it names
The condition of being stuck between two states — neither in nor out, neither accepted nor rejected — with no clear way forward and no way back.
Example
With the merger unapproved and hiring frozen, the team spent months in limbo, unsure whether their jobs still existed.
Related idea
Stasis is stillness with the emphasis on no movement; limbo adds the specific anxiety of an unresolved fate — you are not merely still, you are waiting to learn what happens.
noun · /LIM-boh/
A West Indian dance in which the dancer leans back and shuffles under a horizontal bar lowered on each pass.
What it names
a party game and Caribbean dance testing how low one can go
Example
Guests bent backwards under the limbo pole as it dropped lower and lower.
Related idea
Unrelated to the waiting-place sense: this limbo means limberness, while the theological Limbo — the borderland for unbaptized souls — is the root of the “in-between” meaning.