Meaning and Patience
This quote clearly illustrates to us the connection between MEANING and PATIENCE. It applies not only in the context of psychotherapy but in the whole of life in general.
Impatience seems “second nature” to Kathryn. She confesses that she couldn’t help it.
Her head is swirling in pain whenever we have session recalling and processing her husband’s gambling addiction and sexual infidelities.
She wants to heal her heart, and repair the marriage. She does know what she wants - her big Why. Yet, for many months now since discovery, she admits still feeling helpless controlling herself.
Her frequent physical and verbal outbursts have been constantly derailing the recovery process with her remorseful husband who has submitted to serious therapy.
The impatience only adds unnecessary suffering to her current sufferings.
A good dose of patience therefore is a necessary condition to a successful search for meaning and fulfillment of what we want.
Researchers Priochssca and DiClemente observed that people often relapse before they successfully change a behavior for good.
Relapse is part of the process of recovery. With that, we bear in mind the crucial virtue of patience in going through the stages and starting over again.
Unless we match our life’s meaning or goal with patience, we risk acting and concluding prematurely. We risk settling for secondary consolations or self sabotage.
BrainyQuote posts,
“Patience is not simply the ability to wait - it’s how we behave while we’re waiting. Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word ‘happy’ would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness. It is far better to take things as they come along with patience and equanimity.”
Secrets of Your Self: