I can’t believe there was a time I took pride in the fact that I lacked patience in others. People had to do what I wanted them to when I wanted to. Somehow I felt that equated to strength but now that I am older and wiser I see it clearly. There is so much more strength in being patient.
It’s not easy to exercise patience especially when the body is weak. I’ve had to learn patience as an adult. With no one breathing down my throat about being patient, I had to slowly work on my patience. I had to get humbled by life experiences to see how badly I needed to work on being still. As I write this post, I am still working on my patience. It’s a daily practice and there are days when I’m successful and on other days, it’s a struggle. On my struggle days especially, I realize how much patience I need. I see it clearly now that I cannot be patient with others if I don’t get comfortable extending the same grace to myself and that has helped motivate me to be comfortable with working on improving my ability to exercise patience because I know that what other people get from me is a reflection of what I am giving myself.
The truth is not always comfortable especially when it highlights our flaws. No one wants to constantly see the areas they are failing at. Unfortunately, we don’t get to choose what is comfortable for us especially when it comes to the truth. My journey with patience has brought to light the many aspects of my life that I have not paid attention to that have affected how I show up in this world.
I felt the need to share my lessons with working on my patience because I believe that my experiences will help others see that they are not going through it alone because I have felt isolated when I lacked patience. I felt I was running out of time when my patience ran out and I know how discouraging it can feel when we are deep in the rush the world puts us in. I also want people to see the links I have noted that I wouldn’t if I didn’t acknowledge that I needed to do the work when it came to my patience.
I am learning compassion
My level of understanding has grown immensely. I now see that people are going through a lot and my impatience made me self-centred. It was through my journey with being patient with the grieving process that I learned that people are really going through it out here. From waiting on good health, good grades, waiting on a career shift to waiting on a chance to exhale. We really could do with more compassion in this world and I have seen that I need to do the work to make that happen. I have felt pain and I have let it shed insight on what really matters. It has taken me being still, understanding that everyone is fighting battles and the fact that I am impatient solves nothing for me. It just leaves me anxious, judgmental and inconsiderate.
I am learning to give up the need to be in control
The need to control comes from a place of fear. The fact that I can’t control what happens around me, the future and how people act doesn’t sit well with me. I love to be able to see things coming but these past few years have shown me it is impossible. Grief and the eventuality of death is one of the things I have no control over. My struggle with working on being still has highlighted how much there is that I go crazy about that is not mine to carry. My constant need to control things that are beyond me has hurt me because I have neglected the things that are in my control. The present being top of the list of things I can control. My journey with patience has shown me how costly it is to constantly be in a state of worry and how it has cost me so many connections all because I felt it was my job to control how people viewed me, how people acted and events that were beyond me. Patience has been hard to practice in this regard because it means I have to take responsibility for the fact that my impatience has made me lose people in my life. My lack of patience has made me miss out on the simple things in my life and I have failed to experience spontaneity. We live and we learn though and I am slowly expecting the unexpected and trying to stay present more.
I am learning how sad it is to live with the scarcity mindset
Uncertainty will make you believe there will never be enough. It will have you on the edge of your seat every day. When things don’t go as planned, your mind is trained from experience to see everything else going wrong. We buy into the thought that things might never go back to the way they were and that the dark days will last longer than they do. We’re impatient with the process of facing hurdles; we beat ourselves down bad when we fail to meet our expectations.
Operating from a place of lack will make us act out in ways we shouldn’t. It limits our view on what really matters and we are more likely to ruin the good that is in our lives because we are impatient.
I am learning self-regulation
Self-control is one of those gifts you need to figure out on your own because everything on this planet requires some level of moderation. In adulthood, you do not get a pass for acting out and it has been through my journey of learning patience that I have learned to regulate my emotions. Those who know me know I feel a lot. It’s just who I am. As I grow up I see how it is something I need to be more aware of and it is through being patient with myself that I have learned that sometimes things affect me deeply and it takes days to get out of an emotional funk. Something as simple as someone projecting their emotions on me will weigh heavy on me for days and make me come up with so many responses in my head after that conversation on how I should have responded so that I don’t bear the pain by myself. The best comebacks always come days later when you are in the shower or on a bus home and by that time, no one but you is still bothered about it.
Patience with myself has helped me see that I don’t need to over-identify with what I am feeling. I can be patient as I go through my feels and not condemn myself for feeling. I am not an angry person because I get angry every now and again. I am not a shameful person because I feel shame. It’s tough work but it is possible. It is through doing the work that I have also learned that part of self- regulating means that I need to know when I can allow people’s voices into my head and how to weed out what I don’t need. I have no business entertaining what other people think I should do when my mind is not at ease or when my feelings are hurt. It will only get darker for me and I know this because I have been patient enough with myself to know that I can only take up so much before I break. What I do is separate myself from judgmental people when I am going through my feels and it has helped me really stay calm and deal with my emotions in a more healthy way.
My journey with self-regulation has also made me see that for some people all they know to do is project. Some don’t even notice themselves doing it. People project on to us their expectations of what we ought to be doing, they project their incapacities and if we are going to take everything said to us as the gospel then we will be living miserable lives.
I am learning that I have to stay the course
A lot of the things I set my mind to work with so much dedication and hard work. The rewards are not instant but a girl loves her rewards. The work I do on improving my patience has shown me that I will not get rewards when I want them. Some things especially the big things in life, I will have to do the work and wait. Showing up has been one of those areas. I have had to get comfortable with showing up on the hard days and not waiting for any rewards.
I am also learning that as I seek help I need to be patient and wait for people to offer their help. Sometimes there’s a struggle in letting people help us and we want things to happen on our terms. This makes us miss out on the lessons and help. We end up pushing away help when we need it the most.
Hurt people hurt people
When things don’t go your way and you are not centred, it is easy for you to push people away through hurtful deeds because we are not getting what we want and this is one of the toughest lessons to learn. That when you are disappointed you need to be careful not to disappoint others so that you level some score. That is what being impatient will do to you. You want everything to work in your favour and the moment things do not go your way, you find someone to blame, you find someone to offload your frustration onto and it is simply not right.
We live and we learn each day and that is the beauty of life. No one can claim that they have worked on their patience and need no help or reminders to stay patient. We are tried differently and on some days we will need to be gentle with ourselves while on others we will need to take a firm approach because we know how beneficial it is for us to exercise patience.
Take time and reflect on what areas you need to work on and remember that each day offers the gift of the chance to improve our relationship with patience.
Here is to working on our patience.
Love, Sabali