The Bible Verse in Ecclesiastes 3:1 “To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under the heaven … a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted” is familiar to many if not as a verse, then as the lyrics to the song popular sixties song Turn! Turn! Turn! by the Byrds. At the root of that verse is the power of patience. With patience, mountains can be scaled, oceans crossed and many of the challenges that a come with daily life can be conquered.
How patient are you? Can you make plans and then work those plans as a farmer would till a field? Or a developer would create the next best app? Can you keep your eyes on the end result and do what it takes to get there with diligence and patience? Sadly, most people today don’t understand the value of patience or even of long-term planning. In this world of instant gratification, the mantra is too often “I want it Now.”
When you are patient, you are focused on the end goal and will work to make that goal a reality even if there are challenges and adversities and in spite of most the lure of instant gratification.
According to 1 Samuel “lack of patience can cause you to miss blessings.” Put another way, lack of patience will cause you to rush through a task or overlook key ingredients. Your work will be sloppy, even unusable.
• Patience requires attentiveness—sometimes it requires you to do nothing.
• Patience requires mindfulness and awareness.
• Patience can create mindfulness and awareness in you.
• Patience may require you to perform numerous tasks before you reach the end result(s).
• Patience requires being deliberate in your actions and deferring gratification.
• Patience implies paying attention to timing and then taking advantage of doing the right things at the right time.
• Patience is a virtue; patience is power!
Some of us seem to be born with more of a capacity to be patient than others. But if you don’t feel you have it, patience is a valuable quality that should be cultivated, especially if you want to be successful. It is a necessary part of the process as we walk in purpose. I’m not sure any of us can even know our purpose if we have not been patient and attentive to God’s message to us.
Meditating can be so useful because it is the very essence of patience.
Patience is not about passivity or resignation to one’s condition or fate. It is not an act of suffering, rather in today’s world patience is active and positive.
He that can have patience can have what he will.
—Benjamin Franklin
I found interesting words recently: patience deficit and hurry sickness. It is not possible to be patient if you have succumbed to these two. They are afflictions of today’s world and they are the thieves of your power. They actually inhibit your ability to live in purpose.
When you are living in purpose, it is much easier to embrace patience, to sow the fields, and then reap the harvest. You are fully in the present even as you have the end results in mind. In the end, you will reap what you sow.
If you are unsure of whether you can embrace patience in order to harness your power and reap your rewards, contact me as soon as possible. I can help you identify whether you are suffering from a lack of patience. I can help you to uncover the value of patience and give you the tools to becoming more patient and more powerful in life.
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Photo: Getty Images
Wow this is beautiful!
Patience can be difficult in a time where we expect instant gratification, but it can also be practiced and learned over time. Many times I feel like all of my patience goes into parenting and little is left for everything else, but I have found that meditation greatly helps me to strengthen it. Thank you for sharing!