People seem to want everything now. Suspending immediate pleasure for future reward is not fashionable in our culture. Many have trouble deferring instant pleasure for results later on. In our fast-paced consumer society, people devour material things, relationships, and experiences. ‘Patience’ is the victim of this mad drive to satisfy our frenzied hungers.
Instant gratification, robs us of the rich rewards that could be ours if only we could be patient and wait. Planting a garden requires time, and patience to produce a bountiful harvest. To reap the rich rewards in the ‘garden of life’ we must weed, water and wait. Haste is a hungry ghost that robs us of our inner peace and future delight.
Perhaps one of the best teachers in this regard is the Chinese bamboo seed. Once planted, waiting for it to grow is a true exercise in patience. This little seed like any other requires water, fertile soil, care and attention. It is unique in that the first year there is no evidence of growth. The same holds true for the second, third and fourth years. By the fifth year a sprout pokes through the surface of the earth and within six weeks grows exponentially, reaching a height of eighty feet! In the first four years, when no growth was evident, this seed required someone’s profound perseverance in order to break through and grow tall.
Perhaps one of the most disquieting features of patience is holding the tension of anticipation when we cannot see results. Mr. Trivedi reminds us often that while a garden is germinating, a great deal is happening below the surface even though we cannot see it. He emphatically reminds us that just because we don’t immediately feel or experience something with energy transmissions this does not mean that nothing is happening.
Nature’s wisdom has its own timing. It will not be pushed, cajoled or prodded. It moves at its own pace and marches to the beat of the Cosmic Drummer. The patient person must get in step with this celestial march and follow the lead of the slow but deliberate Life Force that participates in its own birthing. A deep connection to the God of our understanding makes this possible.
It requires much work and patience to become a skilled practitioner, seasoned writer, accomplished musician, or an eloquent speaker. Patience is necessary for dreams to come true; for visions to be realized. A sage Turkish proverb reminds us that ‘Patience is the path to paradise.” It is a foundational ingredient for a life that is full and rich.
Mr. Trivedi reminds us that to be truly patient is a grace. It is when we are connected to the God of our Understanding that we can willingly bear this inner persistence-remembering that much is happening that we cannot see and that the harvest will come at the appointed time. Being connected to God we are favoured with the wisdom to wait and quietly enjoy the bounty that is coming our way.
Waiting patiently, paradoxically, is a very active endeavour. It calls for internal discipline. Rumi said, “Patience is not sitting and waiting, it is foreseeing, it is looking at the night and seeing the day.” Even though we cannot see results, sometimes for a long time, we still need to manage the tension of anticipation without having tangible evidence. Being in resonance with the possibility we hope for, calls for an active adaptation to the subtle tones of the wisdom of nature.
When people are patient they plant believing their garden will bear fruit in the future. The anatomy of patience is like a three legged stool. It looks like this:
The seat is acceptance of those things that we cannot control. We rest in the calmness and peace that flows from our ‘inner agreement’ with the way things are. Firmly fixed in this position we can now fasten our attention on those things that we can control. Acceptance frees us from dissipating our efforts on unrealistic ‘wishful thinking’ or fretting which do not support the final outcome.
The first leg of this stool is the leg of surrender. We surrender to something that we need to endure. An illness, waiting for the perfect partner to arrive, the sacrifice it takes to complete graduate school, the long hours of starting a new business, waiting for a sick child to recover and so on. When we surrender to our situation we are accompanied by gentleness. We are gentle with ourselves and with others.
The second leg is the leg of perseverance. This is the leg that helps us to keep our ‘nose to the grindstone’ preparing the crucible for the reality of the advent. This is the leg that helps us to do what it takes to ‘win the crown’. To persevere is to have the ‘grit’ to stay in the race even when our legs are burning wanting to quit.
The third leg of this stool is vision. The reality we long for, while waiting lives only in our imagination. The light that we see at the end of the tunnel is alive in our mind’s eye. But this mental picture gives us the faith and confidence that after the night, the dawn will come.
To be patient is to constantly adapt and adjust to the hushed tones of nature’s wisdom and hold to the dream that we long for. Linda Kavelin Popov sums it up so well when she says “Patience is quiet hope and expectation, based on trust, that in the end everything will be alright.”
Very good article