Selfishly Patient & Positive
Like most humans, there have been times and season of my life where I have come up wanting in the virtues of patience and positivity. To be honest, I’m still a long way off from having arrived in these categories, but I’m improving.
A few years ago I had this experience that really shed some important light on these subjects for me.
I was in traffic – one of the key things in life that the Lord of Darkness has put into our modern world to bring our impatience and negativity to the surface. It’s rarely good for anyone’s spiritual development. On this particular day it seemed like everyone had lost their minds and their cool. At this particular four-way, the traffic light had gone out and in its place the red light was flashing – which should tell everyone “Don’t freak out, just act like this is a four-way stop and take turns.”
Some people got the message. One lady in particular didn’t. I approached the four-way the same time she did from the crossing street. She looked up at the flashing light and gestured and cussed at it. When someone started to go a second or two before she did, she found herself part of the way in the intersection and needing to wait for the first person to clear out of the way. She lost her mind. From the small, closed in space of her red Mini Cooper, she blared her horn, screamed obscenities at the other car and made gestures that would make the producers of late night HBO pause.
All of this was happening in her own little world, in the confines of her tiny car, and the person she was angry at was far down the road and probably completely unaware of the feelings she wished to convey.
It was a grotesque and disturbing display that caused me to realize three very important things: 1) Her impatience and negativity hurt no one but herself, 2) She has to live with herself all the time, 3) and I can be just that way sometimes.
It was a big “ah ha” moment for me. Before this moment I had unconsciously assumed that being patient was a gift you give to other people, and to a lesser extent, being positive was something you put on for others as well. When I saw that lady losing her mind in the car all by herself and driving off in a volatile and unhappy vehicular world all of her own making, I knew I had been wrong.
Being patient and positive is first and foremost a gift you give to yourself. After all, you above anyone else, has to live with you.
Since then, I have had this mantra that I often repeat to myself, “I will be patient and positive for my own sake.” Over time, I think it has slowly reshaping how I am in the world. What a gift!
Thanks crazy car lady!
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