“The Art of Being Patient”

This post has taken an awfully long time coming along. The past eight months have pann ed out quite differently from what I had expected when I landed back in India that sultry morning in Mumbai. The next few weeks were quite hectic and it took around a month for the dust to finally settle. Contrary to my expectations, the ensuing period saw a wide array of lows strung together by a few highs. It’s rather intriguing to note that all the bad news has come along on the professional front while the good things; though in small packets have come on the personal front.

Very few people in this world have the willingness to learn when the going is easy. We all tend to learn when forced due to difficult circumstances. So I would tweak the oft used phrase and say, “When the going gets tough, The Tough get Learning”. And I won’t hesitate to emphasize that most people fail in tough times because they fail to learn in difficult situations.

In these tough times, with the global financial meltdown impacting people across the globe, I have taken a few lessons as well. The most important of them being, “The Art of being Patient”

Now, a lot of my peers will try & dismiss me saying we all know this nonsense, so what’s new. I would say, a lot. Most of us confuse it with being “Inactive” or “Dormant”. But that’s as removed from being true as is Chalk from Cheese. It’s a state of mind where one takes just about everything that comes his way into his stride without buzzing one bit. For instance, if we take the normal “Action-Reaction” model of the human conduct as a multi-lane two-way road, then the state of Patience allows only one way traffic. Though it has the capacity to handle the two-way movement, it doesn’t allow it; simply to avoid clutter and ensure smooth traffic. Although it slows down the traffic a bit at times, but that’s besides the point because it reduces the possibility of an accident to negligible proportions.

Likewise, Patience is a virtue which creates that extra space to soak in that extra dose of malice & negativity. It gives us time to first accumulate all the information that we come across, analyze it and then process the output, rather than throwing off knee-jerk reactions. As an individual, you take your time to read the situation and make a logical and informed decision based upon facts. Speaking of professional life, it endows you with time to listen to people around you, weigh their opinions and then formulate a conclusion. This helps you endear yourself to your colleagues and leave a positive impression. Just imagine a situation at the work place: you have been assigned a project to be completed in 3 weeks. Your Boss asks for a report at the end of the first week. You, being the proactive committed professional that you are, prepare the report with all the details and also mention the plan for the ensuing week. You promptly go to your Boss with the report expecting positive feedback. But what you get there is something that’s beyond your wildest thoughts. You get a mouthful for doing that extra bit, going that extra mile. You went in brimming with confidence but alas return a shattered soul. It’s not your mistake. You gave it your best possible shot, but things didn’t pan out the way you thought they would. Your Boss didn’t appreciate the extra time & effort you put in to make it better. Because he is in tremendous pressure himself. You need to realize that most of your colleagues are so occupied and stressed out with their work tensions, that they badly need a person who acts like sponge to soak in all their outbursts. Remember you can be the One!

And for people in relationships, it’s like a godsend. It gives you an opportunity to know the other person inside out. Seek and share his/her tensions, frustrations & misgivings. It makes you feel the pain yourself (which at times can be emotionally draining & highly overwhelming) and then formulate a strategy to weed out those negative forces. To put oneself in someone else’s position especially in the time of dire need and sort the problem out satisfactorily gives a high that anything else hardly ever can. It provides you with fulfillment and a hearty feeling that you are no longer a Down the Road, Good for Nothing fellow, rather a True Blue Gentleman with a golden heart (at times a Metrosexual as well).

So, as has already been elucidated, Patience is a virtue that brings along numerous other virtues & benefits with it once we try to cultivate it into our lives. Patience makes one Polite and approachable, just to name a couple. Owing to the paucity of time, I have quoted just a few of the many advantages it has. It helps one retain his job especially during Economic downturn, unless off course, one is extravagantly short on skills. So, the next time you come across an irate person bustling for no rhyme or reason, take a pause, think a bit before you react.