In today’s fast paced world, it’s a challenge to be patient. We live in a world immersed by technology that can cater to our every and any demand. It’s a bit excessive, and crazy if you think about it.
We can be entertained endlessly on social media, netflix and many other opportunities to be mindlessly entertained. Not only that, our needs and demands are met with lightning speed. We can get hot food delivered to our door, groceries delivered to our door. We can use our phone to book a lyft or an uber to an airport, and then book a flight to another city, state, or country!
The world we live in is remarkably complex and patience has moved to the backburner as technology moves things more instantly for us.
But patience is something we need. It’s valuable and gives us very specific value in relationships more than anything else.
What is the Value of Patience?
Patience is simply a measurement of how much you can wait without becoming impatient, or irritated, or not able to wait anymore. It has a lot of real world value particularly when it comes to relationships, especially romantic relationships. It can help you avoid becoming irritated, defensive and saying hurtful things to your partner, friend, or anyone that may cause you to feel impatient. It can slow you down and prevent hasty, selfish decisions. Patience is also beneficial in developing the crucial relationship skill of empathy — the ability to understand life from the perspective of another human.
In other words, the more patience you have, the more empathy you’re going to have as a by-product of patience. You’ll find those that are naturally patient have more empathy than those who are not patient.
Morgan Freeman On Patience:
Morgan freeman was interviewed on the topic of patience and shared an incredibly perspective. Unfortunately that interview clip seems to be lost online. However, oddly enough this very same perspective that Morgan shared in the interview happened to be in the film Evan Almighty with Jim Carrey.
Take a look at what Morgan Freeman Shares About patience in this clip:
Morgan Freeman Shares:
“If someone prays for patience, do you think God gives them patience? or the opportunity to patient? If they pray for courage, do you think he gives them courage or the opportunity to be courageous? If someone prays to be closer to their family does God zap them with warm, fuzzy feelings? Or does he give them opportunities to love each other?”
How insightful was that? This got me thinking a bit deeper about not only Patience, and it’s value in both romantic and personal relationships but also the value of prayer and HOW to pray to succeed.
What was interesting about Morgan’s dialogue in this film was that there was really two lessons.
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Patience comes through practice, not as a “Gift from God”
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Ask God for “Opportunities” and not “Blessings”
Think about the wisdom in this. We need to ‘practice patience’ in order for patience to become a part of our lives. If we prayed for patience and God simply gave us patience, would we really ‘have patience’ in this scenario? Think about it. If patience is a gift that is given freely, would you personally contain the capacity to be patient in an environment that inherently tests your patience?
We must PRACTICE patience in order to BECOME patient. But in prayer, it’s good to pray for the opportunity to be patient so that we can show up, pass the test, and build that patience willpower.
This video explains further:
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