Patience is a virtue, but …!

You have not received any response yet! This is the third time that you are sending a polite reminder email to a person inquiring about something. You are asking whether s/he has received your previous emails. Very gentle, just to ensure that you are avoiding any semblance of impoliteness. But the consequence is the same; you are up in the air. It tries your patience and therefore it is all up to you to take it personal or move on. Julius Caesar was right when he said it is easier to find men who will volunteer to die, than to find those who are willing to endure pain with patience!

In the realm of science, it is of utmost importance to have your written manuscript submitted (and hopefully accepted) in a timely fashion. There are lots of rivals down there who are potentially carrying out similar projects. Early bird catches the worm, we all know that. Now, imagine that your well-written manuscript is in the hand of your supervisor who is supposed to take a look at it and give it the thumbs up! What if it takes 4 months to read 15 pages? Do you still believe in this ancient Buddhist proverb that “the ox is slow but the earth is patient”?! Yes! We all know that initially one should take action, work hard with sheer tenacity, practice patience and hang in there. We cannot just be passive, keep our fingers crossed and hope that luck falls off out of a clear blue sky. Henry Ford, the great American industrialist, quoted that luck and destiny are the excuses of the world’s failure. Thus, we are totally aware of the success equation where it is composed of taking action and initiative, persistence and resilience crafted with love and spiced with passion. But what is patience in this equation where all the above parameters are already met? Still being encouraged to be patient and give it a time after all those efforts, investments and hard works did not pay off. Presumably, plumbers think otherwise, as time/patience heals all things, except a leaky faucet!

Sometimes we are entrapped into ineffective actions: doing the same thing repeatedly. They are fed from either our previous successful experience or people’s advice that make us thinking that we are on the right track. Again! We have taken enough actions and we are quite satisfied with that. What seems to be needed is patience and faith in ourselves. The time is passing and patience is a virtue. Sooner or later, depends on your intelligence or the life circumstances, you pick up your ears to Einstein’s definition of insanity which is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.

However, there is a time that you can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Things are under your control, there is a process which requires a certain amount of time to be completed, and it is not certainly a shot in the dark. Here is where you should embrace patience tightly. We have heard a lot about the virtues of patience, but we need to know that the effect of patience in many life equations is either negligible or harmful. Come in Patience! I have been looking forward to seeing you. I have been taught to put you on a pedestal and treat you with tact and courtesy. But sometimes I just feel you are against the most valuable asset in one’s life: time!