Friday Five - Patience and Persistence

The Friday Five for today asks some important questions about patience, persistence, and their place in our lives. They're good things to think about. Here are my thoughts.

Is Patience a virtue you possess? If it is then is it something that comes naturally, and if it's not then how do you work at it? - I can possess patience at times, depending on the situation. I have gotten much more patient, but I think it is because I have also become more trusting. I think too often patience becomes an excuse for laziness, procrastination, and avoiding work. The only time I am really impatient is usually around gift-giving because I want to tell people, and I REALLY hate it when people lord a surprise over me. I don't like surprises at all!

Being patient with ourselves can be a huge challenge, we are often our own worst critics; is there anything you need to be patient with yourself with at the moment? - There really isn't anything I can think of off the top of my head, but I will marinate on it and get back to you if I come up with anything good!

Are you the kind of person who can/will persist with a difficult task? How much of this is personality related? - I will definitely persist with a difficult task, especially if I am doubted and/or it is something I feel passionately about. I am really not sure how much is personality and how much is training. I feel like both are something that came from my mom, I'm just not entirely sure which is which.

Can you spot when persistence turns into pig-headed-ness, or do you never get there? - I definitely get there and there are times when I have a hard time recognizing it (and there are times when I just plain don't care!) I think that stubbornness has its place and isn't always a bad thing, but I definitely am not sure I have a good handle on that one!

Post a song or poem that helps you re-group, re-focus, and carry on - I really can't think of anything right now because it just depends on the mood, situation, etc. I'm not sure that music or poetry are even my outlets of choice. If anything, I think when I reach that point of teetering on the edge, the music that is best and most helpful to me is usually very high energy. It would seem counter-productive, but actually giving me an outlet for expressing all the compressed energy and emotion helps me to get it all out so I don't explode. It's sort of like opening the lid slowly on a bottle of Coke that's been shaken up. You release all that pressure in a controlled way, and even though there may be a little bit of over-flow, it's a heck of a lot better than if it had exploded!