Why true happiness comes to those who wait
PaTIeNce, so they say, is a virtue. But maybe it’s even more than that. according to research published last week , waiting for things may actually be good for our mental health. Patience has now been found to boost the levels of mood-enhancing serotonin in the brain. The research may be used in the development of antidepressants that modulate serotonin levels, but I thought it was also interesting from a behavioural perspective.
I really believe that one of the main problems with the modern world is instant-gratification. We want something and we get it — just like that. easy access to credit and the internet have meant we rarely have to wait for anything these days.
as a child I remember saving up for months for things and looking back , if I’m honest, the fun was in the anticipation, rather than the thing itself.
When I was 12, I longed for a tropical fish aquarium in my bedroom, saving up pocket money for what seemed like for ever.
But during that time I endlessly studied all t he t anks and equipment, debating what I wanted, learning about plants and how to get the balance just right in the water , poring over fish-keeping magazines trying to choose which f i sh I ’ d get, pestering my parents to take me to the aquarium shop to stand and gawp at all the different tanks. It was thrilling.
That seems to have been lost. christmas is the perfect time to think about this because it’s one of the few times of the year when we have to wait for things. It ’s a shame we are only expected to exercise this skill once a year.
Never mind having to wait until christmas morning to open your stocking, I think we should be teaching our children this throughout the year.
Patience is an invaluable coping strategy. Life is full of uncertainties and things we can’t control. Not everything can happen how and when we want it.
Learning to be patient — how to sit with the anxiety and tension that having to wait for something engenders — is one of life’s great skills, yet increas - ingly it is seen as a failing in modern life.
Waiting isn’t something to be embraced and tolerated, it ’s something to complain to customer services about. Yet we need to understand that frustration happens. It’s inevitable.
If you live your life impatiently, you are destined to be frustrated, full of disappointment, annoy - ance and irritation. People often misunderstand being patient as being passive. They mistake it for letting life happen to you and therefore being weak , or the underdog. But in fact, the opposite is true. It ’s about accepting there are some things in life that are beyond our control, that we are unable to change.
It’s about learning to tolerate this frustration and accept it as part of life — and even enjoy it. It’ s not unreasonable or inhibiting to have to wait. It ’s normal and, therefore, some thing to learn to deal with.
We become frustrated in life because our expectations fail to meet reality . Now , there are times when we can control reality — we can change our jobs or our relationships or our circumstances. But most of the frustrations in life are down to our unrealistic expectations; our inability or refusal to accept the reality. It makes us quick to dispense with things that require thought and time. certainly some people are blessed with the perfect relationship, for example, but the majority aren’t. Things don ’t quite go as we want or expect. We need to devote our attention to these things, and this requires time. Patience is a superpower. It allows you to step back and calmly, medita - tively wait. No stomping up and down at something out of your control. Instead, you are able to relax into the waiting. an inability to accept, toler - ate or even revel in frustration limits our life choices. It means we can never choose the longer—more interesting— road. We can’t choose the path that comes without assurances or promises, that might make us irritable or pro - vide dead ends. I recently started re -learning Latin, deliberately to try to enhance my ability to tolerate frustration. a friend asked me why I’d bother learning a dead language — it ’s not as though it’s of any use in the real sense and she was completely correct.
But that’s not why I wanted to learn it. It ’s precisely because it’s obtuse and frustrating.
My goodness, it ’s so annoying not knowing how to conjugate a verb or failing to remember random vocabulary, but knowing that getting annoyed will not make a jot of difference is pre - cisely why it’s so valuable.
Psychologists have often noted how every major religion sees patience as a path to knowing God. There’s clearly something about patience that draws us in to ourselves and allows a space for introspection.
There’s something wonderfully liberating and empowering about learning to sit with the frustra - tion of waiting . It doesn ’t come naturally to me — I’m the kind of person who wants to push and shove to get things over and done with. I hate waiting and slowness and inefficiency.
But sometimes I choose the slower queue at the coffee shop. I allow people to cut me up and I try to wallow in the wait when I’m on hold on the phone.
There’s a blissful virtue in waiting, if only we allow ourselves to experience it.
A NEW blood test promises to detect Alzheimer’s at least four years before symptoms. But until there is a cure there is no way I’d take it. The prospect of it being positive and then me spending years questioning every time I lose my keys or forget someone’s name . . . no thank you!