Patience

Everyone knows. How often have we heard the well meant advice, and have said it ourselves, “just be patient”.

We know it to be true, we know that time will tell and heal, we understand that rushing, pushing, forcing and willing things is not always the way to go. And yet, when we want something to happen NOW, when we can’t bear the restlessness of our minds, when non-acceptance develops into frustration, patience seems like a far away concept, nothing but a futile, irritating, well meant advice.

But that doesn’t change the fact that facing the uncomfortable or unwanted without patience is, in most cases, positively counter productive. The amount of space patience is capable of creating around an issue that feels cramped up, rigid and unacceptable, is immense.

The moment we allow calmness to enter, tolerating the urge to change something, or act out immediately, we have created leg-room. We have allowed ourselves, or another, to breathe, to stand still and let life unfold in a way that we might not have been able to consider just a minute ago.

Patience is a beautiful quality, the quality of a Buddha. Of a being that trusts, that has the capacity to admit to them selves not to know, to give up action for surrender. To open ones hands in prayer – may clarity come with time.

Talking about patience and surrender though, one should not get confused with postponement or collapse. It is essential to stay present and engaged, but merely allowing another angle, another perspective to arise, that has not been seen yet.

It is not a matter of giving up, it is a matter of giving in.

But like any good advise, even the ones we know make sense, are not always easily, or readily adhered to. Resistance comes, impatience comes, rage comes, pain comes….all and more can make us jump the gun.

We humans aren’t necessarily great at sitting it out, breathing in, breathing out, watching. We like to do, act, be efficient and get it over and done with.

Not always wise, we often know that afterwards. Even in the very moment of haste, if we were true to ourselves and would listen to that nagging little pull in the pit of our stomach, we would know that we are rushing something that shouldn’t be rushed. That we are not honoring the seventh sense that beckons us to hold, to think it through or let it sink.

It is simply not the way we are wired in a time where speed and efficiency are qualities highly revered. Long gone are the times where ones crop would take seasons to come to bloom and be harvested. Everything in our world is about immediate satisfaction. Buy with a mouse click, delivery within the hour, date night by swipe.

We have forgotten the secret language of time and space. The natural pace of nature and life. We don’t listen to the sound of the wind very often, or the voice in our hearts. They always speak of slowing down, of not missing the moment over the future or the past.

They speak of perfection in every given moment, even when impatience is knocking at our doors, willing us to forget to breathe and be, here, now.

“Seek out a tree and let it teach you patience” sais Eckhart Tolle, a wisdom that is far from where we are now, on one hand, and on the other hand, it is just there, ready for us when we are. All it takes is a single moment of stopping to run, of staying still and patiently letting life unfold without our compulsive doing jumping into action.

Just watch…

with love,

Kanika Frings

Co- Founder of DIMA Mallorca, a centre for conscious living & Holistic Counselor

www.dimamallorca.com

kanika@dimamallorca.com