If you ask my nine or fourteen year old daughters (or for that matter my wife) if I’m a patient man, they will probably tell you that depends (and definitely not)!
You see I’m the first to admit I hate to wait, especially behind the wheel of my car, and I’m a nut for punctuality and can’t stand to be late getting somewhere……… but then again I think I am a patient man in life.
So what do you think I mean by patience? ……. I’m not talking waiting pure and simple….well at least not in the sense that most people probably think of waiting! I’m talking true patience…….
” Patience is waiting. Not passively waiting, that is laziness, but to keep going when the going is hard and slow – that is patience”(quote of unknown origin)
So I’m definitely not talking about lazy patience, other wise known as waiting……….you see real patience is work, it means knowing that the outcome that you want is going to take time, it means knowing that to achieve the outcome you want there are things you will have to endure along the way, and it means knowing that despite how much you want it, you simply cannot make it happen any faster.
My greatest teacher in relation to patience is my six year old son, Samuel. Samuel is severely disabled and faces multiple and complex challenges. We can’t make his situation any different, no matter how badly we want to, we can’t fix all of his discomforts, now matter how badly we want to. We CAN and we are DOING things make him more comfortable, but they are things that take a great deal of time and they are things that can cause a great burden along the way, both for him and for us; we CAN and we DO do things to give him the best possible quality of life, we CAN and we DO love him for who he is, but we just have to travel his journey with him until the end!
Edward G Bulwer-Lytton, author, playwright and politician said….”patience is not passive, on the contrary it is active, it is concentrated strength”
……… so………
My Challenge!
I know I can be patient…… and I know I’m not good at waiting….. so my challenge is turn some of the waiting that frustrates me into acts of patience…… so I’m going to start by adressing my frustration behind the wheel by turning it into an act of patience. I know I CAN change my attitude to the situation by thinking about it as a PATIENCE challenge. Sure, I may be late getting somewhere, but that is a consequence I CAN and WILL have to accept, after all no matter what I DO I can’t make the traffic go any faster, but I CAN be patient!
Your Challenge!
What are you going to stop waiting for…… and what are you willing to be patient for and what are you going to turn into a concentrated strength? What CAN you DO……what will you DO!
Post a comment and let me know!