patience

Remember in the ‘old’ days when you watched your favourite TV program and then had to wait a whole week for the next episode, it was torture. But the anticipation and the discussions and dissection of the episode with friends was the highlight of the week and when the following week rolled around, it was as exciting as Christmas morning as the familiar theme song played once again.

The introduction of ‘on demand’ entertainment has changed all this. I am not opposed to streaming at all, in fact I am a big fan and love the access to such a huge and wide range of options but when I explain to my kids about the ‘old’ days of TV and watching one episode per week they look back at me blankly and I wonder if they are missing out on a valuable experience.

With such a over indulgent culture when entertainment is endless, we have food delivered to the door and at a click of the mouse we can order just about anything and it will arrive in the few days are we becoming immune to the blessing of waiting.

When we think about waiting and patience it is often in terms of struggle or pain or disappointment. We do not want to wait for the things we want or need, we want action, we want results. However, we forget about the other side of waiting, the excitement building, anticipation, suspense, expectancy, hope, butterflies in your stomach. Even waiting can be a wonderful experience when looked at with different eyes.

The Bible is filled with people waiting. Abraham waited for a child, Jacob waited for Rachel, Moses waited in the wilderness, David waited to be King, the Disciples waited for the Holy Spirit and even Jesus waited for the right time to start his mission. So why do we get so impatient and think we should not have to wait too?

Waiting is a fact of life; we all experience it. In your future you will have to wait, you will wait for things to happen, for other people, for traffic and appointments, for God to answer prayers and for time to pass. But we all get a choice on how we spend that waiting time. Use your waiting time to be joyful, to be excited about what comes next, to be a blessing to others who might be waiting with you, to connect with God for strength and wisdom when it gets tough, appreciate the present moment and be grateful.

“Patience is not the ability to wait but the ability to keep a good attitude while waiting.” Joyce Meyer

Stop letting your fear of a failure hold you back

For many people, the ‘fear of failure’ is the number one reason for not stepping out or creating something new or trying something they have never done before or to pursue a dream. The fear of failure can stop more people than the fear of the actual activity. It is not so much the jumping out of the plane that is terrifies us but the fear of the parachute failing.

What if you have already tried and tried again? It is even scarier to try once more after you have already ‘failed’.

The problem is not the fear of failure or the failure itself, but our concept of what failure is. Failure is simply when something we did, does not meet our expectations. The problem is not in the failure but in our expectations.

Life lesson – things will usually NOT go as planned or turn out as you expect, that is ok. As soon as you accept this and adjust your expectations the sooner your concept of failure will adapt. Failure is just information collection. You tried, it did not work out as expected, what can you learn?

I have learnt that what I expect to happen and what I think success is, is often at odds to what God has planned for me and God’s plan is always so much better than what I could have thought of.

I might feel like it was a failure and I feel disappointed and discouraged, but God had planned for me to learn and grow. Through my ‘failures’ I have learnt perseverance, patience, grit, obedience, courage, determination, joy and humour. My faith, confidence and trust in God has strengthened and my knowledge of myself and my purpose is stronger. I gain more from a failure than a success.

Reduce the fear of failure by reducing your perception of the risk. For most things we do, the risk is not as high as we think. We might risk some discomfort, some inconvenience, or some embarrassment, but what we will gain in personal growth, character development and drawing closer to God is invaluable.

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
― Winston S. Churchill

Tag Archives: patience

Until next week…

Failure is not fatal

Stop letting your fear of a failure hold you back