Patience is not just waiting around

Patience is considered a virtue, yet in our go-getter culture where decisive action and taking the lead is prized, patience is often undervalued, as if it is just sitting around and waiting for someone else to give us what we want.

But patience is not just waiting. It’s learning to be present with what is, even when what is present is challenging. Impatience causes us to throw up our hands and give up when things don’t happen quickly. It can also make us do dangerous things. Just yesterday, we were behind a vehicle that was parallel parking. And not very well. Oh brother! We’ll be here for a bit! We sure know how to pick lanes. You know the drill. Impatience rose up. But we waited. A couple of drivers behind us also felt impatience arise, and acted on it in a way that put all of us in danger. Just to save another twenty seconds. Sound familiar?

A student in class mentioned the grocery checkout line and how people complain that the new chip system on the credit card reader is so slow. And then you get stuck behind someone writing a check. A check! Really? In this day and age? And, please, could you have a more involved signature? Impatience arises. And when it does, there’s an opportunity to pause and notice it: The sense of urgency to be somewhere else, the boredom with being here, the judgment of others for doddering and of ourselves for poor time management or always managing to pick the slowest line. And while we are noticing that, we can take a moment to notice the sensations in the body: first the tension from our impatience, and then ones that might be more pleasant or neutral. A grocery store is a wondrous place to awaken to the present moment. All those colors and patterns! Very trippy. And then there are the people. When we come into the present moment a sense of wonder and tenderness can rise up and surprise us. We feel a sense of camraderie and even deep compassion for the people in line, even for the lady writing a check.

So patience is the result of being present with whatever is arising in our experience at this moment. And impatience is the trigger to awakening to the present moment, if we stop to notice it. If we don’t, it could trigger a bad mood, or poor judgment that puts us and those around us in danger.

So that’s patience as an antidote to rushing. But there’s another kind of patience that has to do with letting go of our need to see immediate results.

Patience sustains us for the long haul of whatever challenges we face. I was so impressed by my little granddaughter’s patience when learning to sew. She didn’t give up or get angry. She kept trying to thread the needle, even though it seemed the thread might never go into the needle. She seems to know that learning anything new takes time and patience.

She didn’t inherit her patience from me! I remember when I was twenty and took a belly dancing class. I enjoyed the first class. I got the rhythm and could shake my hips easily. But in the next class the teacher had us try to coordinate playing cymbals in our fingers while we were shaking our hips. Suddenly I felt totally out of my depths. I couldn’t do it! Oh no! I didn’t like that feeling. So I never went back! I was so attached to the idea of being a good dancer, even in a dance I was just learning, that I couldn’t sustain the difficult feelings of failure, even if it was only temporary.

It’s uncomfortable to be really unskillful at something. It takes patience. Is there anything you wanted to do but didn’t because it would take you into that uncomfortable identity-threatening place? That’s where the quality of patience really shines. To be patient with our own ineptness is definitely a perfection of the heart.

Patience can also be used as a powerful force for change. Recently Democratic representatives sat on the floor of the House of Representatives Chamber in order to bring gun reform to a vote. The patience to sit until the opposition understands their commitment is not some passing fancy, is a vital action, isn’t it?

But, one might ask, why now? Why didn’t they do this before? Well, they could have, and perhaps they should have, but one part of patience is learning how to be present to notice the flow of energy. In the teachings of the Tao there is the concept of Wu Wei, which I like to talk  about using a sailing analogy, and Wu Wei is the guiding rudder of the boat. Being fully present we observe the tides, currents and winds so that we can chart our course and be present enough to recognize when the time is most auspicious for a particular action. The same action done at a different time would have a different result.

Patience, then, is not just waiting around hoping for things to go our way. It is being fully present with whatever arises in our field of experience. It is embodying our wise intention and using wise effort. We act at the moment that our effort is most effective. At that moment it may feel almost effortless and even joyful.

My mother was a lifelong peace activist, and there were times when she seemed beaten down by the whole process. She felt a sense of defeat because all her effort seemed for naught. All she lacked at these times was insight into the nature of karma, and the patience to trust that as long as she was doing her work out of love for all beings, a difference would be felt. I think of this especially this year when Senator Barbara Boxer is retiring. My mother worked tirelessly, organizing door-to-door volunteers for Boxer’s first run for the House of Representatives. Mom didn’t live to see the amazing span of Senator Boxer’s long career and her many important contributions to the world, based on values my mother shared. Just so, we won’t necessarily see all the results of our efforts, and our impatience to see the results can wear on us. But if we act with wise intention and wise effort, there is a sense of immediate satisfaction in that, and maybe we can let go of needing to see the fruits of our labor. That is patience!

Sometimes we get impatient with ourselves, causing negative self-talk and misery. We can be impatient with others whose way of doing things and sense of timing is at odds with our own. We’ve seen how that plays out on the road or in the grocery store, but this also happens in our primary relationships. Couples often have a discord in this area. My father was always prompt and impatient for my mother to get ready to go out. She preferred to be fashionably late and that drove him crazy. When they traveled he had a schedule of museums they would visit and sites they would see, but she preferred leisurely strolls, impromptu discoveries and hanging out in outdoor cafes. She let herself get absorbed in the daily life of the place she was visiting, open to whatever might happen. So they would get impatient with each other. Much later in life they learned to occasionally go on separate trips.

We might be impatient if we live with someone who has a different idea of tidy, clean or organized. Can we find some compromise? Can we choose to take care of the things that matter to us and not hold a grudge if they don’t matter to the other person?

One of my favorite stories Anne Cushman used to tell, and maybe still does, is about her son Skye when he was a toddler and they would walk to the neighborhood park. Anne was all about getting to the park, but he was all about whatever was happening in this moment, wherever they were. He would get engrossed checking out an ant on the sidewalk perhaps. So for her it felt like it took forever to get to the park, until it would dawn on her that Skye was her best dharma teacher because he was showing her how to be fully present as he held up some interesting find for her to appreciate.

We all get impatient from time to time, but it’s worth noticing when we are feeling that way so we can observe what is actually going on. This is not to scold ourselves, but to see the truth of our experience.

If we can create enough spaciousness and compassion to hold our current experience we can calm our restless eager need to rush past the wonder and on to the next great thing. This, right here and now, is the great thing, if we can only be present to experience it.

What has been your experience with patience? Is it a major challenge? What have you found helps you to be more patient? Or do you consider patience of value?

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