Impatience as a personality trait is a tendency to have something right now, not a desire to wait.

One morning the student and his teacher were walking through the fields. The student asked what kind of diet is needed to achieve purity. Although the teacher always said that all food is sacred, the student did not believe it. “There must be some special food that brings us closer to God,” said the disciple. “Okay, maybe you're right. For example, those mushrooms - said the teacher. The student became agitated, thinking that the mushrooms should give him purity and enlightenment. But when he bent down to pluck one, he came to his senses and shouted: - They are poisonous! If I eat even one of them, I will die immediately! “In that case, I don’t know of any other food that will take you to God so quickly,” the teacher said.

Impatience is the sister of greed. Greed implies future happiness. Impatience, moving in front of its body, cannot live here and now, it, overcome by greed, flies rapidly from one local goal to another, but nowhere does it find happiness. “Hurry up the future” is her motto. At work, she thinks about how to get home faster - there is dinner, TV. Having dinner, she, like a hungry crocodile, mechanically swallows food, thinking about the sofa and the TV. Running to the TV, she watches football, dreaming of scoring a goal faster. Then thoughts smoothly jump into the bedroom: it would be faster to go to bed. And this run is endless, she is always in the future. The charm of the present moment, which, as you know, is called life, is disappearing. Eternally longed for impatience, having achieved a local goal, does not experience joy and pleasure, the happiness of the present moment is ruthlessly squeezed out by the expectation of the future.

A harsh, inelegant and easily excitable impatience tramples with a foot, drum with fingers, slaps his knees with his palms, scratches his nose with the back of his hand, bites or gnaws nails, or scratches various parts of the body. Gesturing like an Italian, she gushes with streams of words in a tense situation. It is unbearable torment for her to wait for the bus, it is better to go on foot, just not to wait.

Impatience easily gets along and works together with such personality traits as hot temper, recklessness, recklessness, superficiality, haste, carelessness, recklessness and irritability. What is outside is also inside. Its internal manifestations are anxiety, nervousness, a tendency to panic and negligence.

Impatience is an acquired personality trait. When parents, like driven horses, rush through life in eternal fear of lack of time, the child becomes infected with this fear. The atmosphere of haste will inevitably lead him to the idea that time is money, that it is the same commodity as ice cream or cake. Since time is limited and passing, with its use, as with ice cream, you need to hurry, otherwise it will melt. The child always lives in the present, but the fear of wasted time has already thrown a seed in his mind. Often, impatience appears in a calm family, leading a leisurely, quiet, measured lifestyle. An energetic youth is irritated by this slowness, it "beats its hooves" in anticipation of the future, it becomes cramped in the sedate environment of the family.

Impatience is a dreamer and dreamer, like a time traveler, she instantly transfers the desired future to the present day. As the enemy of a gradually developing process, she tends to perceive the distant future as a realized desire. Even before becoming pregnant, she already buys a baby stroller, toys and things for the future baby. As an unsurpassed master of visualization, impatience clearly and clearly sees itself in a new house by the fireplace, a beloved dog is basking at his feet, his soul is warm and cozy. Visualization is a great virtue of impatience. The only trouble is that its visualization is saturated with excessive significance, burning desire, the desire to achieve the goal as quickly as possible. In order for the goal to be realized, it must be released, like a bird, to freedom and, on the basis of constancy, approach it daily. Impatience burns the target. Infected with the virus of impermanence, she is able to realize only the goal that, like Newton's apple, will fall on her head.

With its body in the present and mind in the future, impatience brings discord, chaos, confusion and disorder into life. The urge to jump over natural stages of development plays with her cruel joke... Having barely met, she is already in a hurry to the registry office and sees marital relations in a mature phase of development, when the spouses, having eaten half a meal of salt together, become family people, respect and trust each other. Impatience, showing excessive gullibility, immediately transfers his apartment and other real estate to his wife. Finding herself a month later in the company of homeless people, she is in prostration, not understanding how this could happen to her.

Impatience is the opposite of relaxation and rest. In the eternal race to satisfy her desires, she forces the mind to drive an unimaginable number of thoughts through herself at a frantic speed. The unhappy owner of impatience, unable to find a place for himself, wanders from corner to corner, experiences a vague anxiety, ruffles his hair, in a word, resembles a squirrel in a wheel. As a cause of stress, impatience depresses the entire body and, above all, the vascular system. She also has no time to be treated, therefore, without completing the treatment, she escapes from the hospital.

Impatience feeds on the move, eating hastily whipped up food. The idea of ​​having to chew food thoroughly is disgusting to her. All for the sake of saving time. But this "frugality" comes out sideways. Testing the strength of the immune system every day, she nevertheless undermines it and ends up in a hospital bed. For impatience - this is torment, but she does not realize the true reason for such a sad consequence.

Often, it is impatience that causes accidents and disasters on the roads, accidents at home and at work, sports injuries. Being a friend of stupidity, she will not go around the mountain, but, on the contrary, will trample up the mountain directly, along the shortest, but also dangerous route. Then, having broken his arms and legs, he will lie for many months in complete immobility, cursing himself for his manifested quality of personality.

What could be worse than an impatient politician, general or surgeon? An impatient politician is war and adventurous decisions, an impatient commander is a waste of sacrifice and a lost battle, an impatient surgeon is a collector of corpses. In fact, the following story took place, in which impatience played the main role that led to disastrous results. One impatient doctor removed all of a patient's teeth because he had mistakenly assumed they were the source of the patient's pain in another tooth-related part of the body. He set to work, not wanting to wait for the results of laboratory tests. And in vain. When the test results were ready, they showed that the unfortunate patient's teeth had nothing to do with the source of the pain.

Impatience is incapable of active listening, she always wants to insert "her own five kopecks", interrupt, finish the expressed thought for another person. Showing incontinence, she rebuilds others against herself, causes them irritation and unwillingness to communicate. Being in a woman's guise, impatience takes the "bull by the horns" - does not wait for the man to call her, and takes the initiative into his own hands. It is not in her rules to wait for him to "give birth" to a marriage proposal; she is the first to propose to a man to "ring". Everyone knows how impatience is harmful in sexual relations.

In the process of personal growth, gradual and thorough assimilation of new knowledge is needed. Impatience, with her desire to do everything quickly, from sex to developing her own worldview, leads to superficiality and dissatisfaction. What is the use of hurried positive statements or formal visualization? What is the use of hurried meditation or prayer? If you hurry, you will make people laugh, and impatience, speaking with a "learned air of a connoisseur" about a sensational novel, which she judges, having read only its table of contents, shocks everyone with its ignorance.

Petr Kovalev

Each of us constantly finds himself in situations where we are forced to expect something: whether it be transport or a traffic signal, the arrival of summer or the fulfillment of obligations by someone, a result or the arrival of a feeling. And, as often happens, we periodically sigh deeply, asking a rhetorical question: "Well, when will THIS happen?" It feels like every one of us was impatient. Where does this unpleasant state come from and how to cope with it - today we will talk about this.

As always, let's start with the definition: "Impatience is a lack of patience, calm expectation, restless aspiration, without restraint and composure, waiting for something. Possible manifestation is not sitting still, fidgeting, sighing, the subject can drum his fingers on the table. Lack of patience, calm waiting. ; excessively strong desire, desire, restless aspiration; haste, haste, haste, inability to endure, indulgence to one's will. Impatience is akin to recklessness. Synonyms: impatient, impatient, impatience, impatience, lack of self-control, lack of patience. " This is what the encyclopedia says. (Immediately asking for language and the sisterly concept of "intolerance" - this is a deeper topic (remember only medieval intolerance and thousands of people who were burned at the stake).

They are impatiently awaiting the outcome of the case.

The horse, impatiently, beats with a hoof.

They bite their nails impatiently.

People, experiencing impatience, begin to get irritated, angry, sometimes unrestrained and even rude. The impatient always rush somewhere, are late, show nervousness and at any moment are similar to a time bomb ready to explode, discharging into space with insults, accusations, shouts and insults. Later, perhaps, they will be ashamed of their behavior, but in a moment of impatience they have no time for psycho-philosophical reflections. At such moments, a person is not his own master, he is like a slave of impulse and often behaves like a savage. Somehow I heard the expression that an impatient person, that a car without brakes ... looks like, doesn't it? Why does such a state periodically visit many of us?

Let's figure it out. We can initially assume that spoiled people are impatient, who are used to getting everything immediately on a silver platter. However, this is not the case. This category just knows that sooner or later it will get a piece of its pie. But those who are not confident that they will get what they want and begin to show signs of anxiety while waiting. People begin to feel fear that until their turn comes, the product will run out or that the traffic jam will last forever. The world is perceived as hostile and dangerous: "no one will ever help me." Such people have a broken basic trust in the world, they are in perpetual conflict with circumstances. Typically, the source of this position is laid in deep childhood when brought up in emotionally cold relationships, selfish parents, or when parents demonstrate anxious behavior.

There is another psychological "trap" that contributes to the development of impatience in character: parting with mother in childhood for long and even short periods of time (depending on age). The anxiety of waiting for the baby, fueled by helplessness, is emotionally experienced very strongly and the "notch" remains for life. Any waiting situation can trigger the emotion of early childhood anxiety. An unconscious desire to stop painful memories and provokes human impatience.

Thus, impatience can easily ruin a person not only mood or day, but also life. In addition, in a situation of expectation, a person is in a state of uncertainty, but this already appears as a specific fear of closed doors.

Summing up the above, it becomes clear that with the mechanism of impatience many strong emotions are turned on. Of course, first of all, it is anger. Often it is your inner child's unconscious anger at your mother, who left you (even for 20 minutes) at one time or another. Naturally, plus anger at the one who created an uncomfortable situation. At such moments, it is good to distance yourself from what is happening, not to go into any reasoning, but instead, simply release the emotion outward, expressing your anger in a civilized way (if you are alone with yourself, you can expand the scope). It is very important here to be aware of what you are doing and allow yourself to show your anger.

The next way to deal with impatience is to listen to your body. Where is it tense, in what areas is anger or fear hiding? You can even consciously increase this feeling by tensing your muscles, right down to your facial muscles. Straining, hold your breath, and then, along with a strong long exhalation, push the tension out of you and relax the muscles. You will immediately feel better and more confident.

It must be remembered that in a person's life there are objective circumstances that we cannot predict or influence them. You cannot foresee all the traffic jams, the length of the queue at the box office, the organization of other people or farce-majeure circumstances, but it is quite possible to structure your “time management” by adding additional time to it for “unforeseen situations”.

It is important to remember that life is not a continuous treadmill and out of respect for yourself, you need to be able to find time for yourself, your beloved (beloved), periodically turning off your phone or “forgetting” your watch. At first, you will feel anxiety, but then, after going through a period of getting used to the good, you will understand that life flows at different rates and in order to feel happy, you just need to accept this fact.

Impatience makes a person vulnerable, deprives him of his will, does not allow a person to take place as a person, to take a proper position in society and be respected. It turns out that impatience can easily control a person, but everything should be the other way around. Although "pulling yourself together" or "letting go of the reins" is everyone's personal choice. Is not it?

During times of stress, patience breeds peace of mind, not anger.

What is patience? I prefer to look in the dictionary first: "patience: the ability to accept and endure a delay, difficulty, or adversity without getting angry or upset." I don't know anyone whose life is free from these three factors. In fact, I cannot remember a single day in my own life without the presence of one of these feelings.

For many years my reaction to them was "anger" or, at least, "upset". Then I realized that this response only made the already stressful and unpleasant situation worse. So I started consciously trying to react to "delay, difficulty, or nuisance" in a different way. Sometimes the best I could do is tolerate the presence of these factors. However, I continued these attempts and, with practice, it became easier for me to “acknowledge” them with an open heart as an inevitable part of my life.

When I was able to do this - tolerate and sometimes even acknowledge delay, difficulty, or unpleasantness - I noticed two things about the psychology of patience. First, being patient is about being compassionate about yourself. Empathy is a way to reach out to those who are suffering, including yourself. I undoubtedly suffer when I am impatient, because a lack of patience is a stressful reaction to what is happening in my life. I can feel stress both in my mind and in my body. So cultivating patience is about taking care of yourself, which is the foundation of self-compassion.

Second, I've noticed that patience improves self-control - peace of mind makes it easier to deal with ups and downs, rather than rushing about like a boat caught in a storm. The correlation between patience, increased self-compassion, and self-control convinced me of the value of patience. I thought, "Hmm, less suffering and less stress, plus a calm acceptance of life as it is ... sounds good." If you want to learn how to learn patience, then I recommend that you practice as follows. (Note: I explore this thought and emotion transformation approach in more detail in my books How to Awaken: A Buddhist-Inspired Guide to Managing Joy and Sadness and How to Live Well With Chronic Pain and Illness: A Handbook).

1. Realize the emergence of impatience

This can be difficult at first. When something goes wrong (for example, we are stuck in traffic), we tend to think that the reason for our impatience is external - something that happens "there." Naturally, the reason is what happens in our minds, namely, our response to the circumstances we face. So start by watching for impatience in your mind when something is not going the way we would like it to.

You may already know some of your annoying factors: when you are kept waiting too long; when you are in a long line; when you are trying to figure out a computer problem; when you have to wait a long time for a doctor; I have to listen to someone explaining something very simple for an impossibly long time (the latter is a trait of mine that tests the patience of my family!).

Note that impatience tends to occur when something goes wrong - especially when people or our environment do not live up to our expectations, even in circumstances we cannot control (such as traffic jams or long lines). Our expectations are often not in line with reality. I can give four examples of these expectations, all of which can provoke impatience.

First, we tend to expect the environment to meet our expectations: no traffic jams, no lack of parking spaces near our destination; no long queues; no delays at the airport; no long wait for food in the restaurant.

Second, we tend to expect people to live up to our expectations. They should behave the way we think they should behave. "The woman in front of me in line shouldn't be chatting with the cashier." "If he said he would call at exactly three o'clock, he should call at exactly three." Even if we are “right” (after all, it is polite to call at the promised time), people often do not live up to our expectations, it is a fact.

Third, our expectations are often unrealistic in terms of developing new skills, be it a new craft, working with a new application, or fixing something on our own. We think we should be able to learn new skills quickly, no matter how unfamiliar or difficult they are to us.

Fourth, our expectations are almost always unrealistic about what is happening in our minds. We think we should be able to control the thoughts and emotions we have. Nevertheless, unexpected thoughts and emotions arise all the time. Thinking and experiencing emotions is in the nature of our consciousness; in my experience, it cannot be stopped. Without a doubt, impatience does not stop this process!

2. Explore how your mind and body respond to impatience

Allowing yourself to feel impatient is an important step towards recognizing it. This is important because, in my experience and from a psychological point of view, it is impossible to begin transforming a tense mental state until you admit that you are stuck in it. So work on getting to know well how impatience feels. Is your mind calm or agitated? Is your body relaxed or tense? I have never felt impatience as something pleasant for my mind or body. The realization that this is an unpleasant feeling helps me to motivate myself and try to change the way I react to “delay, difficulty or trouble” - our three friends in the dictionary.

3. Begin to transform impatience into patience

It takes practice. Practice full of patience. And since patience is an act of self-compassion, I hope you will sympathize with your inability to be patient in some cases. In this regard, here are some strategies for transforming impatience into patience.

Let's start with situations where the environment or people don't live up to your expectations: for example, you are stuck in a traffic jam, or you find yourself in line right behind a person chatting with a cashier. First, notice that you are responding impatiently to the situation. Second, pay attention to what you are feeling in your mind and body. Then ask yourself, "Is there anything I can do to change the situation without making things worse for myself and others?" If your answer is “no” (in most cases it will be), then see if you can find what I would call “good” in this situation. Namely, start focusing on something enjoyable or interesting while you wait.

It is a training in self-awareness, that is, you make a conscious choice - supported by effort - to pay attention to what is happening in your field of consciousness. When I feel impatient, I can almost always find something in the present moment that piques my curiosity or interest. It allows me to react to what is happening not with “anger” or “upset,” but with patience.

While in a traffic jam, you can consider different brands, models and ages of cars on the road; you can strike up a conversation with another person in the car; you can find a radio station. If I find myself in a long line, I can be amazed at the ridiculous headlines in the tabloids posted on the counters next to the cashier; you can look at the people standing around me - how they all look different and each of them has their own life story, about which I know nothing; you can even overhear the chatter that is holding me back!

In general, I try to cultivate friendliness towards chatters, enjoy the way they enjoy each other's company. After all, what's another minute or two in line? If, like me, you find it difficult to stand for a long time, you can look for something to lean on or get into a stable posture to be more balanced. Sometimes I carry a cane with me.

I mean, yes, the initial choice is to establish a “no traffic congestion” rule and a “no checkout chatter” directive, but most of the time we don't have that choice. When this happens, I know that I prefer if one alternative is upset and anger, and the other is to try to make the experience enjoyable, or at least bearable.

There are also unrealistic expectations when developing new skills. This expectation is partly shaped by our rush-rush-rush cultural attitude, no matter what we do. However, if we acted slower and more patiently, we would not only get more enjoyment, but we would also likely develop this skill better.

Finally, about unrealistic expectations in controlling our consciousness. Instead of being impatient ("angry" or "upset") about what is happening in our minds, we could treat unwanted thoughts and emotions more easily, sometimes even with humor about the unbridled mind. In my new book, How to Wake Up, I quote from one of the first Buddhist books I read, Mindfulness in Plain English by Bhante Gunarathan. Here's what he said about consciousness:

“[One day] you will come face to face with the sudden and shocking realization that you are absolutely insane. Your consciousness is a screeching, muttering madhouse on wheels, rolling randomly down the hill, completely out of control and helpless. No problem".

I love this quote for two reasons. Firstly, I am reassured by the fact that I am not the only one with a squealing, muttering madhouse on wheels instead of consciousness. Secondly, Bhante says, "No problem." I understand “no problem” as confirmation that I can learn to be patient with this “crazy” consciousness. I can learn not to be upset or angry when unwanted thoughts and emotions appear, and instead calmly acknowledge their presence, knowing that, over time, the universal law of fragility will help me. Conditions will change ... and so will my mind.

We can transform impatience into patience. It's worth the effort, because being patient is about being compassionate about ourselves, and it also helps us calmly accept things as they are ... and it's a good feeling.

Tony Bernard, lawyer, former UCLA Davis law professor, Buddhist practitioner, author of books

A 2003 study that appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that the more impatient and nervous a person between the ages of 18 and 30 is, the more likely they are to develop high blood pressure in the future. “High blood pressure is a symptom that the body is overworking,” Boer said. "The whole body seems to be on alert and cannot relax properly."

Impatience + hostility = stress

People who are very impatient and nervous are in a constant state of stress. The body responds to this stress by releasing hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol that help our bodies cope with stressful situations.

“When you’re about to be attacked by a saber-toothed tiger, your body’s reaction can save your life, but it’s another matter if you’re nervous in traffic or in line,” Williams said. High levels of cortisol and adrenaline can ultimately lead to increased weight and blood sugar levels and increased blood pressure.

In 2002, scientists found that young people with increased level hostility predisposes to the formation of platelet plaques in the vessels. "Stress hormones cause blood clots to form in weakened vessels that are already constricted by heart disease, which ultimately lead to heart attacks," Williams says. "These hormones cause the body's fat cells to accumulate in the blood, clogging up the blood vessels."

How to deal with impatience?

Some research suggests that stress reduction programs can help impatient people relax naturally. Teaching people how to control their feelings and emotions, especially feelings of anger and hostility, can help lower blood pressure and even body weight over time.

The best way getting rid of the impatience that causes negative emotions, - learn to control them. Take a deep breath and reflect on exactly how you are feeling. Ask yourself: “Is it important to me? Should you be nervous at all? Are there real reasons for anger? Williams advises to calm yourself down and let the anger subside.

Since people do not know how to manage time, they have to wait for an event, and this is by no means to everyone's liking. Patience is not an innate ability, so you have to develop it, but rarely does anyone think about it, which leads to adverse consequences.

Patience at work

Sometimes this or that case is difficult to complete, despite the fact that professional qualities fully correspond to it. This happens for several reasons, one of which is lack of concentration. To complete the task, you need to completely abstract from the environment and join in its implementation. It is curious that the presence of an irritant may not be obvious: if the source of the noise at some point overpowers your concentration, then the obsessive thought or anxiety does not immediately draw attention to itself.

To avoid a nervous breakdown, find out what the reasons for your impatience are. Before starting work, make sure that there are no irritants around, and your head is free of onerous thoughts. Get rid of anything that gets in the way of being productive.

Of course, the work itself can be a source of impatience, or rather, the expectation of its completion. Impatience loves to confuse you by replacing thoughts of activity with other goals, for example, when you are doing boring work, you want to finish it faster and go home. It doesn't work faster and you get angry, and the more you yearn to finish the work, the more difficult it is to do it, respectively, the goal is not in a hurry to meet you and the circle of impatience closes.

To avoid resentment, build a logical chain that clearly demonstrates the meaning of the problem, so that rationalism will moderate the impatience a little. After that, take a short break and rethink your attitude to work, try to treat it with due respect so that it does not annoy. In addition, you can translate it into a game form, for example, divide the lesson into several stages, and then try to complete them one by one for a certain amount of time. Distinguishing parts of the work will make progress in doing it obvious, and competition with the clock will give the work a sporty interest. The psychological component of the question is very important - tune in to the fulfillment of your duties, convince yourself that they are really entertaining, and most importantly, do not focus on the goal, since it only distracts you from progress.

Waiting without difficulty

The goal exists without work, so in some cases it is enough just to wait to get what you want. In these situations, anticipation builds interest and stimulates the imagination, but it also takes up your time. Let's say you're waiting for a movie to hit the big screens. Impatience revisits all the trailers, re-reads numerous interviews and reproduces the first day of the rental and its contents in the smallest detail, and at the same time takes away time from you that you could devote to other activities.

Patience is not synonymous with inaction. It is designed not only to nullify negative emotions during work, but also to keep you from wasting time. In one case, restraint works for the goal, and in the second, it abandons it in favor of other things. You are in charge of the process of switching these modes, therefore, use time sparingly and do not waste it on trifles.

Global goals

Oftentimes, impatient people ignore the mathematical meaning of life. They see it as an abstract value of self-realization, but in fact it is a concrete timer that counts the melting of your temporary capital, which means that it must be distributed responsibly and carefully.

Of course, life expectancy cannot be calculated accurately, so let's use an average. Let's say you are given 65 years, and this is 23,742 days (3,391 weeks), 17 of them you lead a dependent lifestyle - 6,209 (887), 5 years of study - 1,826 (260). There are 15,707 days or 2,243 weeks left to devote to making life easier. In order to build a successful career, on average, it takes 25 years, we take them away and we get 6,576 days or 18 years of carelessness.

They work for success for a long time, and maybe all their lives, so those who want to achieve something should accept this fact, and for this they need to overcome impatience, which aches like an ulcer, making it difficult to concentrate on achieving the goal. Fear can help. Calculate how much time you have left, and then reduce that number over the weeks. 23 thousand days is not so much already, and the evaporating residue will all the more make you reconsider your life plans and the quality of their implementation.

Imagine that the time allotted to you in this world is a big lottery win that needs to be allocated for the purchase of certain achievements. An impatient person believes that you can win in life with small investments, but instead he loses both small bets and the winnings that disappear before our eyes. In contrast to him, a strategist who understands the scale of the game pays with a win both for tomorrow and for the distant future, and, despite the fact that he spends all his capital at once, every big step in life returns his investments twice.