21/07/2024
"Patience is an action.
Rumi says that the heart is like a vast reservoir and the human eye is like a tiny jug that cannot hold more than a day’s worth of water.
In other words: we’re too addicted to what we see, whether it’s the cheap trinkets we gawk at in shop windows, or the horrors we can’t stop watching on our phones. But whether good or bad, the visible world only ever shows us a small sliver of life, and it always leaves us thirsty.
But there is a world beyond the visible — and it’s not mystical. The joy you feel when you help a friend or give someone encouragement. The pleasure you feel when you close your eyes and experience yourself as a body breathing. These are part of our human potential, and just as real as what we document with cameras and objectifying gazes.
I often hear people say, “Don’t fall in love with someone’s potential.” But that’s not quite right. Yes, you shouldn’t fall in love with romantic projections. But loving people’s potential is how we grow. No one is going to come to you already displaying perfect kindness or understanding or sensitivity. You need patience to grasp the latent goodness in all beings, especially in yourself.
Yeats said, “The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” But patience is not passive. It’s a moment-by-moment act of attention. When the mind wanders off, like a herd of cats, into its habitual fears, patience is the act of gently bringing it back: to this moment, to what is possible now, to seeds that, watered with loving awareness, might one day be trees.
It takes concentration. We don’t like that word in the West. But if your mind is constantly pulled by impatience, you’ll always be afraid and always starting from zero. Don’t give up and tell yourself you just lack patience. Patience is an action. Do it once. Then do it again. Keep doing it till love flows from every direction." - Paul Weinfield
