Mar 28 2008
A Virtuous Woman: Patience
The virtue of the day is… wait for it… wait for it… PATIENCE! Perhaps another casualty of the modern age. Do you remember the early days of the Internet? The dial-up days? It routinely took 20-30 minutes to load a page. Yeah. These days, if it takes more than 10 seconds to load something, I’m on the phone to the Dell call center in Bombay raising hell. Ah, technology.
No entry in this series would be complete without the obligatory visit to the dictionary. (It’s amazing. Last week, I would’ve sworn I knew the definitions to all these words, but there’s a lot of nuance that gets overlooked in casual language.) So, patience is:
(1) the bearing of provocation, annoyance, misfortune, or pain without complaint, loss of temper, or the like;
(2) the ability or willingness to suppress restlessness or annoyance when confronted with delay;
(3) quiet, steady perseverance, even-tempered care.
Like diligence, our culture seems to be evolving away from patience. Society doesn’t seem to encourage bearing anything without complaint. Got a headache? Take a pill. Having a run of bad luck? See a therapist. (Now, there are plenty of people who legitimately need therapy–I’ve been down that road myself. What I’m talking about is a general unwillingness in our society to experience emotions like sadness or anger.) Get cut off in traffic? Tailgate the guy for ten miles.
The notion of enduring negative emotions or experiences without complaint or loss of temper is just… kind of strange. Could that be part of what’s going wrong in our society–the reason we drink so much and take so many drugs (prescription and recreational) and either eat our way to diabetes or starve ourselves to death? Is the prospect of feeling sad or lonely or bored or angry or guilty so terrifying that we have to numb ourselves with whatever substance or behavior we like to indulge in? Having struggled with addictive behaviors in the past, I can’t help but wonder if cultivating a willingness to bear emotions without complaint could be part of the cure.
I like definition number three–”quiet, steady perseverance; even-tempered care.” Even-tempered care. I’m not really sure I know what that means, but it certainly sounds like something I’d like to work on.
What do you think of my theory? Too simplistic? Right on? Dead wrong?
Table of contents for Virtues
Patience…something I’m lacking. Like your ideas behind it, but maybe it’s something bigger than all these virtues. Just a thought, but perhaps what we really need to work on is self-contol, self-responsibility. Maybe if I would take more responsiblity for “why I was cut off in traffic” I wouldn’t feel the need to “tailgate for 10mi” to show him my frustration for what he did to me…
Perhaps your onto something here…
Patience…I need to talk to a confident when going through this and God is the first one I call on.
Sometimes I tuck a note in the Bible so I can let Him handle it.
Hugs, JJ
Thanks for the E for Excellent award.
All I know about patience is that I need more of it!
But seriously, you make some good points. When I’m feeling impatient, I try to just breathe and relax.
Patience is definitely something I need to work on more. Generally my solution is to avoid those things that I know in advance are going to piss me off (sitting in traffic, visiting busy stores, etc). It tends to work out pretty well.
Patience- also a bad spot for me. I keep thinking it will get better as I get older, but no such luck.