Patience with Self

Posted on by Betul Erbasi

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Hi everyone,

I hope everyone is doing good! Today’s topic is patience with personal development. It is sort of a follow-up to my post last week about forming routines.

I am patient with people. If someone is misbehaving, I don’t react (warnings aside) because I know that everyone makes mistakes on their way to better themselves. Yet, I am not patient with my own development. I want to get to the destination quickly and when I don’t, I get demotivated. Say, I have a research project. I want to achieve the analysis as soon as possible, with leaves me with little understanding of the data. I scan and skip the data-understanding stage so I can get to the next level.

And spoiler: this does not work. Everything has its own time to grow in us. Data should grow in me first, so I can have an analysis of the well-understood data set.

What does this require? Patience.

Let’s say we want to be able to read a book every week and currently we don’t read a lot. If we really fast start by reading a book for each of the first several weeks, we will likely burn out. Instead, we should start by targeting the consistency (for example, 15 minutes of reading everyday) and maybe we will finish one book in a month or two months. If we can keep to this schedule, this time will naturally increase to 20 mins, 30 mins and ultimately we will be more likely to hit our reading goal of reading one book per week.

What does this process require? Patience.

Patience will give us the best results in the long run. We will not be reading one book per week initially, so it might look like we are failing. But at the end, we will establish the habit. If we start fast, we will maybe achieve the goal for some time but it will probably not be consistent. So, it might be better to think in longer terms and just bear with initial failures. In fact, these are not failures. They are just steps towards the goal.

Do you think you are patient with yourselves? If so, were you always like that or did you learn it? If not, are you working on it? If you have established habits for yourselves, how long did it take you to establish them? Let’s talk about patience this week!

Betul

54 thoughts on “Patience with Self”

  2. This is very true and rightly said. Most times we fall victim of giving people a second, 3rd, 4th time doubt while we don’t even afford ourselves the one time comeback chance. We must remind ourselves that we cannot get there one. Only the fuel of patience will help us.
    Good peice.

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  3. I believe that we have to hold patience and impatience is a dynamic tension. I have seen people and organizations that were too patient, as if they were waiting for the rest of the universe to come and rescue them — it never happens. I can’t say that I know where to draw the line precisely, but I know that sometimes I have had to get impatient with myself, less so with others.

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    1. That is a good point! We can’t just sit around and wait for things to happen. What I had in mind was when we try something, it does not work out initially but we keep trying. That is the patience I had in mind. Maybe this is active patience.

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  7. oh, patience. patience. ugh. Before stumbling on this post, I was feeling very impatient with myself. It has taken me a while to learn how to work for things and not sit around waiting. But I can still do that. Sit around and wait to become the newest author or podcaster or influencer while doing nothing. There I said it- I struggle with being just mediocre. I needed to read this post, thank you. It has given me some tips on how to meet some goals of mine.

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    1. I am glad it did. I have been on different ends with this. I have been on the not-doing-anything end and I have also been on doing-too-much end. The first does not bring in anything and the second attempts an early birth. Neither is right. I am still working on balancing. We are all works in progress!

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  12. That situation reminds myself. And on top of it I become angry to myself and people around if don’t have quick results. Now I am working to be consistent and let things happen not as per plan. I am using concept of “I chose” instead of must or should do. It give to me filling of control and responsibilities…

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  14. Pingback: Patience with Self — Pointless Overthinking – Alchemical One

  16. I completely agree. I can be very patient with my family and friends, yet I’ll often ream myself because I had neglected my studying for a couple of days, or because I let myself get distracted. I’ve got to be kinder to myself.

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