Hello there and welcome to my seventy second blog.

“Patience is a virtue,

Virtue is a grace,

Grace is a little girl who would not wash her face.”

Sadly, patience is not one of my virtues. In fact, if I take this little poem by Dick King-Smith to heart, I may even be the girl with  the cleanest face in the universe!!!

My impatience often starts very early in the day.

It happens when the car in front of me is travelling at 40 kilometres per hour. I kid you not. The speed limit is 60 and I have places to go and people to treat.

Then it’s the interminably slow to change traffic light. I am convinced that the central controller sees me coming and deliberately slows the change time.

Then it’s the friendly person in a car in front of my driving through the booms who engages the security guard in an interminably lengthy discourse while I sit counting the minutes..

Then its Google chrome that is not responding, and then the printer will not sync with my laptop, and I have left the printing to the very last moment.

The person ahead of me at the mini-Woolies at the Engen garage who either forgets their pin, adds items to their shop or cannot find their card… and I have a patient waiting.

The person who does not answer a What’s App and it had been blue ticked, and I am in need of a reply ASAP.

The medical aid consultant who puts me on hold for twenty minutes when all I am asking is if the account has been paid?

The chicken casserole which is just taking forever to cook.

A very late grocery delivery and it’s the ingredients for supper.

Explaining something to someone and they are just not getting it.

This is just a fraction of the things that make me impatient.

Having a little read of this made me stop and think.

I am beyond a super impatient person.

This is quite scary.

This needs to change!

Reading I learn a few things about patient people.

1. Patient people are perceived to be more friendly and relaxed. I think I am friendly, but relaxed, sadly not. Except when I am lying on the couch watching a lighthearted movie, doing a lecture online and then very quickly I fall asleep.
2. Patient people are better able to focus on goals. This is probably why I am never able to be clear cut about mine and the reason I am often needing life coaching in this regard.
3. They are less prone to angry outbursts. My impatience may be leading to my intermittent tongue lashings and temper losses.
4. Patient folks can learn new things, rather than giving up out of impatience. So, I almost gave up bridge due to my impatience (and possibly lack of concentration), but now armed with a new birthday gift of a bridge book, I am raring to go. In other areas, I do not give up.
5. They have stronger mental health, due to less stress. Fortunately, I am very in touch with this aspect of my life and feel that I generally manage it pretty well.

Where I believe my patience is quite strong is when treating my patients. I seem to be able to adopt a calm cool alter ego and for this I am grateful.

However, in the constant pursuit of improving myself, I decided that it’s time for me to employ some new strategies to learn to be patient.

Here goes: –

1. Why  am I impatient?

Most of the time on reflection it is due to me wanting to maximize my time. However, being impatient is not helping in any size, shape or form. Perhaps my strategy can be to do some deep breathing when I feel the impatience starting, and then assess what the reason for my impatience is.

 

2. Practice makes perfect..

I can just try to practise patience.. I can try to do that jigsaw puzzle from start to finish or read   War and Peace from start to finish. Perhaps I can even ban myself from looking at my phone whilst waiting for an appointment. These tasks require patience, they force me to wait and push me to remove expectations.

 

3. Realizing that I am just uncomfortable.

When I am stuck in traffic or have been put on hold, it can feel really yuk, but it is actually just discomfort. These situations are not life-threatening or impossible, so even if they are not enjoyable, they certainly are bearable. Learning to recognize and accept this discomfort may make it easier to cope with.

 

4. Journal my impatience.

I have found it beyond useful to journaling my acts of kindness during October and I do believe that writing down my impatient moments could also be useful. Following on this, i can start documenting my patient ones.

 

5. Find a distraction.

Many situations that demand patience simply require me to wait. Whilst waiting I can answer a mail or complete my daily French Duolingo (I have gone back to improving my French). There are always ways to fill the time that do not include feeling cross or negative.

 

6. What sets off my impatience?

Most of us have common triggers that set off these impatient feelings and recognizing this is half the battle. I can find ways to alleviate them or learn to accept that they will continue to occur. What I do now is when I send a What’s app requiring a reply, I just archive it straightaway so that I do not get impatient with the lack of response.

 

7. Practise empathy.

A lot of time the reason for my impatience is another person. Reminding myself that the cause of my impatience is only human and that they are more than likely doing the best that they can, may help me be less impatient. We have no idea what is going on in other people’s lives.

 

8. Meditation and mindfulness.

Here we go again. Paying attention to the present moment will help me to be grateful for small things and will allow my body to relax and focus on nothing else but the next breath. I can honestly say that I am practicing this with my belly breathing and am cautiously optimistic that I may be doing quite well.

 

9. Have time out.

I need to perhaps walk away from the causative impatience story or just literally have some time out before things go pear and my viper like tongue rears its ugly head.

 

10. Accept what I cannot change.

I need to acknowledge that at times there is absolutely nothing I can do about a situation. I need to strive to accept the things I can not change. Perhaps I can employ a mantra like “this is out of my control, let me just breathe.”

 

11. The bigger picture.

Will the cause of my impatience matter in a week, month, or year? If it does not interfere with the bigger picture, then I may be able to let it go more easily. Not that simple for me.

 

12. It’s about my goal.

If I am impatient about someone in one of the retirement homes, I need to remind myself that my goal is to give my patient’s the best treatment, and that may mean putting up with some tardiness at times.

 

13. Finding healthy ways to alleviate my impatience.

I find exercise does help, talking to people and breathing. I am beyond blessed in having properly good sounding boards in my life.

 

14. Learn from others.

Assess the way in which others deal with impatient making situations and try to emulate them. I love assessing and observing, so reckon this could work for me.

 

15. Be patient with patience.

I just love this! As with anything that I strive towards in my self-improvement mission, it’s about baby steps, all the way. Allowing myself to be impatient sometimes. My 80/20 story. Trying to be patient 80 percent of the time and 20 percent of it letting myself get impatient. There are times when it does not pay to be patient. My self-worth is paramount. In some cases, being patient may be more damaging for me than confronting the issue heads on. There are occasions when impatience is necessary.

 

 

16. Focus on the small wins.

Those times when I can stem my impatience, must be celebrated as a success.

 

17. Some faking it.

I am not really a faking it person but perhaps this may help me. Only time will tell.

 

18. Ask others for help.

Losing patience does not happen in a vacuum and other people are almost always involved in the situation as mentioned above, so when appropriate, I need to reach out and ask for help.

 

19. Be kind to myself

I need to realize that sometimes I am tired, stressed and working too hard and my impatience may just be born of the fact that I am doing too much. I need to work through this, make sure I give myself enough self-care and be kind to myself

 

The bottom line for me is that there are numerous ways for me to work on becoming more patient and I am going to challenge myself to do this. I will continue to be kind to myself, to forgive myself for the times that I am impatient, to optimize my breathing and breathwork., and to continue in my quest for acts of kindness to others.

With thanks to Sam Ovens.

 

Wishing you all a week of awesome patience and  abundant kindness.