One area that I've felt like I struggled for most of my life was being patient. I know there are many ways that these things are explained and treated medically as impulse control issues, but I've spent enough of my life medicated to know that it never did anything to really fix this perceived problem for me. I've written fairly extensively at this point about my issues with control and addictive behaviors that I've managed to work through, but it still strikes me as somewhat hilarious when people call me patient.
Today I was reflecting a bit on why that is and what has changed over the last year and a half. Over time, I've become aware that in this 'surrendered state' in which I no longer feel the need to control things that I no longer have that overwhelming urge to 'make things happen.' I suppose on some level I figured that it was related to letting go of expectations and assumptions, because in general I'm just more content with how things turn out and I'm less attached to any idea of how I think things need to be. It still leaves me with the question of why or how that makes me patient.
Perhaps my perspective on patience is just wrong or different than others. Growing up I was basically taught that patience is being able to wait for things I want and that if I couldn't wait I wouldn't get them. I suppose this was my parents trying to enforce some version of impulse control on a nervous and overactive child, but if anything it just taught to me to be manipulative and insincere. Over the last year and a half of writing and working through my personal issues here on steemit, I've learned to embrace authenticity, so clearly my old perspective of being patient no longer works.
Continuing my dive for this answer, I consider the fact that I feel I have pretty well defined personal boundaries at this point. When I'm not developing expectations and assumptions of others and I'm mindful of my own boundaries, it's very easy to be patient with others that aren't trying to be overtly violent or manipulative. In situations where I feel that people are being threatening or abusive, it's very easy to remove myself from the situation as I don't expect that others will change or assume that they need to change. After all, it's just my perspective that the things they are doing are wrong after all.
So at this point, it's becoming more clear to me why some others may perceive me as patient, but why do I not think of myself as patient? Perhaps the problem is that learned belief from my childhood that patience is the act of waiting for things to happen. I can say in all honesty that at this point in my life waiting for anyone to change or circumstances to change themselves no longer really works for me. If I want to do something I do it and if I want to change something I change it. It's clear that the concept of waiting is lost on me at this point because I believe that we only exist in the present moment.
I don't say this as if I don't have desires or hope for a better future. If anything, I'm actively progressing towards those things and whenever they happen is fine with me. If the never happen I suppose that the most reaction that the universe would get out of me at this point is a shrug. It's just curious to me that it still doesn't feel like patience. Perhaps patience is really just about knowing our own priorities and not being overly focused on anyone or anything else, so in turn everything else just kind of becomes irrelevant to some extent. I'm already doing what I want to do and I'm already who I want to be. Namaste.