Definition: Patience

Patience: Awareness and acceptance that one has no control over the external components of their life; most notably, those matters pertaining to other People.

A recent experience led me to contemplate this, for me, extremely elusive quality. I've touched on my internal struggle with Patience in previous articles, but it wasn't until I realized the true nature of this trait that it dawned on me why it seems to remain slightly out of my reach. Critically, patience requires a complete acceptance that I do not, and can not, control anything in my life that is outside of my own thoughts, emotions and actions. Simply put, damn near every aspect of life. 'Shit' happens, and the only thing I can control is how I interpret that 'shit', how I feel about that 'shit' and how I decide to act as a result of that 'shit'.  Acting with patience requires acceptance, which is a quality even more elusive to me than patience! I, like most people and particularly Adult Children of Alcoholics and Americans in general, find a lack of control down-right intolerable. In the past to muster up some patience in a disagreeable situation I've often found myself repeating the Serenity Prayer, especially the bit about "accept(ing) the things I cannot change," those which lay beyond my control.

Indeed, a secondary definition of patience might state: Being content and finding serenity in an otherwise uncomfortable situation. Still more interesting in that a listed synonym for patience is self-control, because a patient person understands and accepts that that is the only form of control they possess.

As an example let's visualize some situations that illustrate patience; parents smiling as their children scream hysterically for reasons they can't begin to fathom, a person contentedly chatting to the 30 people in front of them in the DMV line (and whom also didn't lose their shit when they are inevitably told once they are next that they've filled out the wrong forms or were waiting in the wrong line all together), a Gen-X'er attempting to show their parents or grandparents how to copy/paste internet links or find a video on YouTube.  These people have an admirably high tolerance to the influence of other peoples' emotions and actions, nor do they allow themselves to be victimized or held hostage by these stimuli. A small yet significant subset of the World's population, these people are my fucking idols. 

Conversely we can easily think of examples of the opposite scenario, which is unfortunately also much more common. The person getting pissed off at the grocery check out because the clerk failed to enter a sale price properly, someone irate with a barista who accidentally made a latte instead of a cappuccino, the scumbag in Wal-Mart dragging their kid along by their T-shirt as the kid screams something about wanting a candy bar. 

Warning, in true Squirrel fashion I'm about to take this in a completely different direction. Ok, I'll admit it; I got dumped. In an attempt to figure out what the fuck happened I contemplated some of the issues that kept coming up, and the road blocks that ultimately led us to realize the relationship just was not going to work out. I thought perhaps if I could've been more patient, moved slower and learned to be more relaxed, I could have made the relationship work. My problem was that the guy did not seem to want to spend time with me. By his own admission he was a time-selfish person, and since I'm much the same I didn't think it would cause an insurmountable obstacle. This characteristic, however, came to make me feel rejected, confused and resentful. I told myself I was too needy, expected too much and would ruin the relationship because I couldn't relax and accept that I had no right to control how someone else chose to spend their time. For me once I heard "I love you" there should have been a commitment to incorporate into each others lives; a critical difference in our way of thinking and how we expressed love. Everyone told me that I needed to take it slow and be patient. I fought against everything I was feeling instead of just accepting my emotions and feeling secure in who I was and what I needed in a relationship. I'm not a relaxed person, for me patience and acceptance are a process that require time and practice; skills to be honed since they are not inherent to my nature. Instead of supporting and loving myself through that process, I denied my needs and lost my sense of identity (I'll discuss this topic in detail in an episode of Squirrel Radio). This was neither my fault nor his, we just weren't compatible in our relationship needs and/or had different concepts of what constitutes a committed relationship.

What I have come to realize is that patience does not mean moving slowly in an relationship, it means accepting that I have no control over how slowly someone else moves or their other emotional needs. Yet honouring my own needs is paramount and it likewise requires patience; I have no control over where they came from, I just know now that if I deny them my normal happy and loving Self becomes compromised. For a relationship to truly last, these needs should be naturally sated by both people. Though relationships require work and maintenance, efforts being shared equally, I learned that if it feels like something is being forced it's not going to work and that is OK. Sometimes love is simply not enough.

Relationships aside, I've always recognized the usefulness of implementing this quality into my personality; who wouldn't want to act as a serene example amongst a background of chaos? Providing an unrelenting positive example for other Humans to witness, rely on, admire, and hopefully, pay forward. While going through my first transformation in early 2012 I came to understand that my life goals where to learn humility and patience through this Human experience. Well, I've been kicked in the balls by life enough now, mostly in the form of tempering my addict and anxiety driven mental illness, to have learned humility (for the most part, but damn, I do have a lot of kick-ass qualities too!); but I admittedly gave up on the patience component, thinking it wasn't that important after all. Wrong! I now recognize that relent was my inability to surrender control, and I'm thankful for this new perspective so that I can re-attempt the lesson from a different angle.

Though it doesn't come naturally to me, I can learn to possess and embody patience, at least to the degree to which I am capable. It will be extremely difficult, require constant conscious decision-making and continual acceptance to break my old behavioural habits. Remaining serene when what I really want to do is put my foot through a wall or yell at someone to hurry the fuck up is no easy task. Reacting is much easier than choosing to act differently. Yet I'm optimistic that the change will be well worth my effort; especially if it allows me to cultivate healthy relationships, letting them evolve organically instead of forcing them past their innate boundaries. Critically, I want patience with my own emotions and needs. The ability to accept them and let them flow instead of telling myself that I have unreasonable expectations. I am who I am, a pretty, smart, funny, honest, emotional, work in progress; and protecting that inner unconditional love is the only way to ensure that I can give it to someone else.