I’m starting to talk about attitudes in Mindfulness, you asked for it so much 🙂 A 10-post series on attitudes is beginning.

The first one, which is a threshold for me, is PATIENCE. It can gain meaning for you as a whole when you’re finished with it all. In MBSR exercises and practices, we try to adapt these attitudes to our own lives and the lives of our participants.

Throughout my life, I was a very, very impatient person. I wanted everything to happen immediately. For example, when I liked a pair of shoes when I was little, I wanted my mother to buy them right away. The more she said, “Let’s not buy them, let’s look at this store, let’s look at another one,” the more I would go crazy, refuse to look, and throw a tantrum, saying, “I want that first one right now, immediately!” Then, in adolescence and young adulthood, there were times when I used superhuman strength to get what I wanted immediately. I had no patience to sit and wait for anything. Then I realized that the things I strived for immediately didn’t make me happy in the long run because I took them out of their normal flow.

In Mindfulness, Patience is accepting that everything has its time. Furthermore, it’s about being patient with yourself, even when you can’t be patient. That’s the hardest part… Do you know how it’s for a hyperactive person who can’t sit still for 10 minutes to be patient with themselves, Sebastian? It’s difficult 🙂 But whatever we repeat, the brain accepts it as a habit. I’m now even trying to be patient with the restless “Me” inside me. It’s good, we’ve made peace 🙂

This spring I observed baby crows. It was my first time. Those baby crows were so cute. I’m usually a little wary of crows. I’d seen them attack cats a few times and realized how strong they are. For me, crows are creatures to be admired from a distance, but seeing baby crows makes me realize that every strong creature has a beginning, and they reach that strength with tiny, patient steps. A crow that will one day be strong enough to challenge many animals can’t even fly when it’s a baby. It stays in the same place for days, waiting to gain strength. Its body has grown, but its feathers are still baby feathers, curly. It’s so young that it might turn its head and fall asleep on the edge of the sidewalk in the middle of the day. It’s gathering strength, not rushing… It doesn’t say, “Other members of my species are flying, challenging seagulls, I must too,” it waits patiently because it knows that if it tries now, nature will swallow it, it won’t allow it.

There was one baby crow on my street, and another on the next street. Every morning and every evening, they circled in almost the same places. Every time I went outside, I wanted to see them to make sure they were alright, and I also wished they had grown stronger and flown away.

This spring, I learned from the baby crows… To be able to flap your wings, to fight, to do what you want, and to live freely, you must patiently prepare yourself. When the right time comes, nature will make you do it… It will say, “Fly, baby,” and then you will fly without even looking back.

Those who are tested by patience might find solace in nature. I try to do that as much as I can now. It’s one of the long-term approaches we use in stress reduction programs. Would you like to try it? 🙂 It’s difficult, but not impossible 🙂