ART OF PATIENCE

I cannot say why I haven’t smashed this blackberry phone against the wall. For the umpteenth time it has gone off in the middle of a chat. I try to tether it with my laptop and connect to the internet and without warning it blanks out. I have never really fancied a blackberry from the start, I saw it as an article of ostentation and a tool for promoting flamboyance. Half the people that use it hardly know the full function and for me I wasn’t a crowd follower, it didn’t matter what they were following. I feel different now though.

I bought one out of the need to harness the only 3G functioning network in my region and to maximize my browsing time and data. It’s a known fact that I kill phones. I don’t know how it happens but if a phone lasts a year with me then it is really a Methuselah. I bought a blackberry so it could be useful to me. Unfortunately,

I get so angry that seriously if not for the kind of testimony I would be wont to give in future, I would have slammed that phone into the hardest wall around but what would it amount to? What would I say happened to my phone without having to tell a lie? This phone had definitely taught me patience. For when it goes off and on, it wipes all my data in chat and I have to start all over again. It is pretty vexing.

I have had worse vexing situations. Is it when I audibly hear my students say disrespectful things under their breath or when my mum looks me in the face and says something so immature that I begin to wonder if she thinks I am still a suckling babe? When my dad demands that I see him immediately without caring to know what schedules I have arranged for the day? When my brother prolongs a discussion and wearies me without helping out with a solution or when I ask the children around to leave my house and they think it is time to play hide and seek?

At those times I feel like giving them a piece of my mind. I feel like they should know that this is not funny and I am very mad at the unmet expectations but surprisingly I have mostly kept my calm while the boil within cools to a moderate temperature. I knew I would feel good letting it all out so that they would not repeat it again or so that in the near future they would reconsider before behaving in like manner. What happens after the feel-good emotions is what I dread. I know for certain that I would rethink the situation and my meditation would not be one that would gladden me. I have surprisingly held my calm so far.

It’s not that I fear people and I do not know what to say. It’s not that I am a leader and must watch my steps. It is not that I want to live and prove that I am so much in control of myself. No, not at all. It’s that I try to weigh the benefit against what I would be portraying. I owe it to myself to get better and I know that getting better involves change(s) and positive change normally treads a part that isn’t so smooth.

I remember one or two friends that had done very annoying things and I could have spoken or lashed out at the moment but I didn’t and time later they realized and returned to apologize. I imagined how it would have been if I had lashed out then, who would look more like a fool?

I won’t forget the day a friend told me that a student had said that the way he is looking at things, if I dare to snatch his girlfriend, he would deal with me. The said girlfriend was by far the most beautiful girl in the class and her classmate who was dating her was feeling very insecure. He felt (no, he knew) that his lecturer knew more than he did and that could pose a problem for him if I decided to stage a “Mr. Lecturer” approach towards his girl. Suffice me to say that if that had been my thought even for a split second then I would conclude he was making some sense but it never crossed my mind. I was angry hearing such demeaning statements yet I was calm.

He later hooked up with me on a social network when he had an issue and I was of help. I wondered what would have happened If I had foolishly acted on that knowledge that spilled in my direction. I may not have called him to order because I never judge from hearsay but I could have acted differently in class or even when he hooked up with me if I had fed from the information I heard.

An adage would say that words are silver but silence is gold. Silence is an obvious form of patience. It is easy to talk especially when provoked. Keeping calm is a lot more difficult. You could be taken for granted in silence. You could be assumed to be a fool when silent. You could be thought to be a weakling when you are reticent but I have learnt that what people think will always be what people think and never what the situation really is.

I have turned a blind eye and a deaf ear in many situations and circumstances. I have acted differently from natural expectations and the reason is not far-fetched. I am learning to be a better person. I would not want to call it maturity but I cannot detach it from that. I still rant sometimes and over-flog issues but the consciousness of repeatedly doing such is so awakened in me that I never ever do it without considering the impact before or after.

I am not really a patient man but God is helping me. I have a lot raging inside of me but one thing I know about a habit is that the chains are too weak to be felt until they become too strong to be broken. I would keep trying my best to keep my calm when all is well and when all is unwell. I would keep trying to increase my boiling point and decrease my condensation mark until I have reached an acceptable standard.

I am better than yesteryears. I would be better tomorrow than I am now if I continually improve and that I will. I will best my records and influence the already influenced emotions until I can look mess-ups in the eye and smile like nothing is wrong. 

I will get there and this virtue that is highly priced would be a prize for me when I have won the battle and breasted the finish line. Patience breeds wisdom and I want to be wise!