7 & 7: Patience vs. Impatience

REFLECTION:

Patience is not stasis but pace. Patience is not retreat but rather a form of preparation. Humans are most impatient with themselves, expecting growth without leaving time for maturity, expecting perfection from imperfect creatures, expecting pleasure without pain. Patience is realistic but hopeful. Patience is delay, not denial, a determined vision that holds fast. Patience is sensitive to time. For success is rarely, almost never, probably never, instantaneous. It is not the nature of things to ripen from the start. The environment must have its say. First blossom, then the fruit to age in color, texture and good taste. To go through all that is to be worthy of selection. To shorten the process in a burst of self-will may get a person picked but then discarded with first bite, not ripe enough, not yet.

MUSES:

Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections, but instantly set about remedying them – every day begin the task anew.
St. Francis de Sales

Never think that God’s delays are God’s denials. Hold on, hold fast; hold out. Patience is genius.
Comte de Buffon

They also serve who only stand and wait.
John Milton

Actually, I’m an overnight success. But it took twenty years.
Monty Hall

Nothing great is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.
Epictetus