Patience is an important attribute in life. Without it a lot will go wrong; dreams and aspirations will be shattered.
There is a proverb that says ” A patient dog eats the fattest bone”.
This saying might no longer be true but the message stays the same and is true. Patience is a virtue and a very important one at that; in pursuing my dreams I have had to learn how to be patient with myself and others. I was not always the patient type, I always wanted things done quickly and be over with; this might be a good thing but when things don’t go as planned, frustration, anger, sadness and the likes, flood in like the rivers and streams pouring into the ocean.
What is patience? You may ask.
According to the online etymology dictionary, patience is the “quality of being willing to bear adversities, a calm endurance of misfortune, suffering, etc.,” the key word for me here is ‘willingness’ this is important because if you choose to do something out of your will then nothing can stop you. Given that there is nothing sweet or easy about bearing adversities, enduring misfortune, or accepting suffering, the significance of the willpower in pursuing our aspirations cannot be over-emphasized.
In a world where everything is just a click away, patience can almost be seen as a waste of time. Today we believe that things come by easily and fast too, given that we can place orders, and in split seconds we have them delivered to our doorsteps. We want things, and very quickly too! If it is not now, then never. Yes we can get most things immediately but some do take time and these often than not are the best things; building relationships, building a career, learning a new skill, adapting to new cultures, building empires, raising kids, finding yourself, letting go of a bad habit and the list continues.
To have patience, we must have hope and believe that at the end it will all be worth it. We must focus on the prize, the glory that awaits such a venture that demands so much of us; this therefore, means that our patience cannot be in vain because on a daily basis we press toward something greater, with the conviction that the present sufferings or inconveniences are nothing compared to the victory that will be revealed in due season.
A man/woman with great ambition must accompany that with great patience as well, and the reason is not far-fetched, for nine out of ten times you will be subjected to frustration, not by choice but by circumstances and lessons that you must only face and learn along the way to achieving your goals and dreams. But patience alone cannot do the job, hence, hope is a pre-requisite. Alongside patience, we must keep hope alive and not stop believing that the fruits will yield in due time. This combination is important because every good thing takes time, we have to plant, water, wait for it to grow, weed out the unwanted, harvest and then enjoy the fruits of our labor; it is a process.
It is said that when the going gets tough, only the tough get going; but I dare to say that when the going gets tough, only the patient, hopeful and those who believe keep riding in the turbulent and stormy sea of uncertainties and great suffering and discomfort, because they knew from the onset that it was not going to be peaches and cream, hence, were fully prepared to fight it out; because it is only when we forget what we are fighting for that we quit. Continue reading “THE VIRTUE OF PATIENCE”
Self love is not when you take care of yourself at the expense of others, we have to believe that we all have an immense impact on our surroundings and when we choose to take advantage of people so we can feel better about ourselves, the ripple effects extend beyond our imagination. Show yourself some love by accepting who you are, honestly you cannot change your person because God intended it that way, there is no other person like you in this whole world, think about this; in a world of over 7 billion people, no one else has your finger prints, now this is cranking, you are uniquely made and you have to come to this realization and love yourself more. The good thing about this thought process is that, it helps you to look at yourself and others as gifts to the world to bless it with the uniqueness’ that we possess. This brings me to my second point.
As highlighted above, we are all unique and hence have our unique selling point (USP) that is different from everyone else, what we need to do is to find this USP, develop it and then bless the world with it, with this kind of mindset, we compete with no one but ourselves and hence appreciate and love others as much as we love ourselves. No wonder Jesus said, love your neighbor as yourself, this is not too difficult to do when we realize that we are different, unique, and distinct but someway somehow we all came from the same creator. Have you ever sat down to think of the fact that out internal organs are exactly the same irrespective of color, size, and status etc. Accept, appreciate, and love yourself some more.
I will tie this point to the first, we all have our strengths and weaknesses, however most of us tend to be so critical to ourselves, we beat ourselves up for falling short, for not measuring up to standards set by others or even the ones set up by us. One thing we might not know is that we indirectly treat others the same way we treat ourselves. Do you have a very critical person in your life right now? watch their life closely, they are probably very critical of themselves, desiring perfection in everything when we know that we are not perfect and are only pursuing it. Show yourself some grace, I am not saying your should welcome mediocrity and pat yourself on the back when you make mistakes, what I am saying is that know that we are not perfect and whether we like it or not we will fall short at some point; therefore, be gracious to yourself and learn from those mistakes and move on with your life. This mode of operation (MOO) will help you extend grace to others when they offend you or fail you at some point.
This point ties in very well with point number three; truth is we judge ourselves because we want everything to be perfect and apparently lack grace. We go through our day judging ourselves because we are either not satisfied with our looks or pay too much attention to the things we cannot change, the sad thing about this is that we extend this to others unknowingly. We see someone walking or sitting in front of us and in a split second we make inaccurate judgement calls by subjecting them to our insecurities and imperfect standards, the result, we lose the opportunity to interact, make friends, influence, and inspire change in people’s lives. Resolve to abolish this mindset of judging yourself and others, accept and embrace yourself and others then you will experience the joy and peace that comes with loving yourself and others unconditionally.
Direct Insights 