Sermon for Sunday - February 16, 2014: A Bit More on Patience

How to be Patient 

Have patience be your goal for the entire day. Take a day and make a serious effort to take your time and think about everything you do. Live in the moment and be mindful of yourself and your surroundings. Think of your day as a movie where you can hit “pause” at any time. Take regular pauses and at the end of the day think over all the decisions you made and seek to understand exactly what took place. Eventually, learn to do this on a daily basis.

Slow down. Sometimes we must rush, but we think we need to rush more than we actually do. If you are hitting pause a few times each day, you will likely notice when you are rushing for no reason. When this happens, just stop for a minute and take a few deep breaths. Turn you mind to peaceful things and center yourself, then return to your task with a slower, more deliberate pace.

Delay gratification. By putting off reward and rest, we are training our patience “muscles.” The longer we put off gratification, the more we will be able to enjoy it when the right time comes. We should live each day for the evening and each week for the end. If we work hard and accomplish all the day’s tasks, the evening can be our own. Sometimes this is difficult, but we must be steadfast and deliberate. This takes practice, but the more you do it, the easier it becomes.

Think before you speak. This quite literally means that you pause and consider what you’re going to say before you say it. If we blurt out the first thought that comes to mind without considering the consequences, we will often find ourselves saying stupid or offensive things. Practice this for one whole day and think about instances where it was good or right for you to consider your words before speaking. Often we will realize that the extra time allowed us to formulate better, more articulate responses.

-- ULC Monastery: Sermons - The Seven Virtues 

Let's take these from the top.  I almost have the first goal down.  I try not to stress over much.  If something starts to needle me, I give it one good "Arrrgggg!" and simply take a break or go do something else to distract me from the issue for a few until I can look at it with fresh senses and understand it.

I got a speeding ticket yesterday morning as I was going to work.  I wasn't in a hurry; I just had a lead foot.  I seem to press the accelerator on that portion of my drive.  The bottom of the hill is a major intersection that I know I'll have to wait at regardless, so it makes little sense to rush.  Just to prove the point, I found myself doing the same speed today, right passed where the cop was yesterday.  I did a rapid deceleration and chewed myself a new one.  The thing was that I found my insurance card that I didn't have yesterday.

This next one is the most difficult for me.  I work hard for my gratification.  I see no purpose to delaying said gratification for any reason, least of all to teach myself patience.  But, I am making the attempt as it also helps me to maintain my weight.  Yes, bourbon, peanut butter and honey, pizza, sushi, bourbon, ice cream, bourbon, all gratify me and all pack on the pounds, but doesn't that just figure?  Most things I find gratifying are usually fattening except for, well, women.  Not fattening.  Although, even though I love all women, I find few of them truly gratifying.  I guess their kind of like ice cream.

This last one, really?  Mom always told me my mouth would be the death of me.  She hasn't been far from wrong.  I find it exceedingly hard not to say what's on my mind, and care little about who I am saying it to.  One plus in this has been the plethora of military commanders, and one particular civilian senior vice-president of operations, that relied on me to be the one person not blowing smoke up their collective butts when they asked my opinion.  Good or bad I told them the way it was.  This was a far cry from learning how to run from the bullies I would goad on in high school until they came after me to deliver a deserved, or not, butt whippin.  I am getting better at picking my battles.  I try to temper honesty with a proper time and place, and I re-write memos until they are a bit less pointed (read: antagonistic) while still getting my message across.

Take a moment this Sunday and consider how patient you are.  Think about ways in which you can work on where you come up short on patience.  Right now, for me, I still seem to lose my mind when I'm behind some idiot that is so patient he has lapsed into a coma while merging onto a 60 mph highway doing 15 mph while an 18-wheeler hauling a load of logs is growing significantly larger in my driver's side mirror.  I have learned to take a deep breath, relax, floor the accelerator, cut across two lanes of traffic, test the patience of several other drivers, and exhale.  

Life is good!

"Patience is not sitting and waiting, it is foreseeing.  It is looking at the thorn and seeing the rose, looking at the night and seeing the day."

 -- Rumi (1207-1273), Persian poet, Islamic jurist, and theologian