Patience

Patience is something that I have truly had to practice in my life. I have heard it is a virtue and understood that it is something of serious value to a developing individual, but to truly understand it has taken me on a journey of deep insight and discomfort. At my age, about to turn 30, I still find myself so much in a hurry and wanting to shape everything in a manor that slows it all down. Even this has a certain hectic vibration to it, "wanting to shape everything in a manor that slows it all down."

Wanting is without a doubt one of the strangest and most dualistic experiences I have encountered throughout my life. To want something is not only a mental experience, that intention of wanting makes a physical pull as well. Whether it is conscious or unconscious, once I have decided that I want something I begin to shape every experience into how I can get that thing.

For example, I want sex. When I have that want, I begin looking for someone. So to begin looking for someone I begin going to places where someone might be. This might lead to bars, parties, somewhere to eat, etc. The elements that schedule my time are pushed and pulled towards where that potential connection might occur. Then once it is found, what next? I have just spent my energy and time seeking this person, convinced them to fuck me, and then what? The want has been satiated.

What's next is typically the emergence of yet another want. Our days begin to become filled with the quest to satisfy this little being inside of us that must be fed, lest it becomes irritated and starts to tug at our internal strings. So for most of us, the day is a long series of want/satiate with a little sprinkle of want/disappointment. I wake, i'm hungry. I eat, i'm thirsty. I'm full, I shit. My hair is a mess, I work it. My clothes are old, I buy more. I'm hungry, I eat. I'm tired, I drink coffee.I'm wired, I get stoned. I digest, I shit. I'm bored, I I I i iiiiiiiiiiii.............

It really becomes a story of self-indulgence, all of this wanting. But you might say that you have to eat and sleep and and and, well sure of course. But what happens if we really stop taking out the wants? Pick one. Any one want and see what happens when that want comes up. Do you need it for your survival or mental health? Are you justifying that you need it just so you can have it? Does the craving go away when you don't satisfy it?

For me, refined sugar has been a kryptonite for the majority of my life. My mother has a serious sweet tooth and I adopted that trait for sure. I think most children growing up in the world today have some relationship with sugar. When that desire comes up, though, I drink water and wait 30 minutes. If the craving for sugar comes up again, I will usually drink some more water and wait again. 98% of the time that craving goes away, but the 2% that remains I usually satisfy it in someway. Not by running to 7-11 and getting the mormon family sized candy bar, but I will eat something sweet.

My point being, this life is here for us to experiment with. If we let ourselves fall into the rut that is urge satisfaction, we may just fall into a funky pit that becomes harder and harder to climb out of the further we go. Remember, though, change on this planet happens very slowly and deliberately. Have you ever sat and watched a Ponderosa grow, or stayed to see the tides change? We are no different in our quest to grow.