How are you with patience?
Not in theory—but in the daily moments:
🚦When someone cuts you off in traffic…
📲When they don’t text back fast enough…
⏳When your partner is taking too long to get out the door…
💻When your launch, your healing, or your to-do list isn’t moving fast enough…
If you’re anything like the couples and individuals I work with in my practice, chances are patience isn’t your favorite virtue. In fact, impatience is one of the most common patterns I support people in transforming—especially in relationships, where different pacing styles can create tension, misunderstanding, and even resentment.
The Cost of Impatience in Relationships
When we’re caught in impatience, we often experience ourselves as harsh, restless, or judgmental. And when we’re on the receiving end, it can feel like pressure, like we’re not good enough, or like there’s no room for grace.
Take one couple I work with:
One partner expressed how frustrating it was to constantly wait on the other—whether to get dressed, make a decision, or leave the house. The other, meanwhile, shared how inadequate and rushed they felt, constantly scrambling to meet a pace that wasn’t natural to them.
They weren’t fighting over dishes or timing—they were clashing over unacknowledged nervous system patterns and differing relationships with time. It’s an extremely common dynamic.
When we rush, when we force, when we push…we close our hearts.
We stop listening.
We prioritize efficiency over connection.
A Culture Addicted to Urgency
In truth, much of what we experience as “urgent” is not urgent at all. It’s manufactured.
Our culture—shaped by decades of corporate interests—has conditioned us to believe everything must happen now. That speed is success. That if you’re not moving faster, you’re falling behind. This is what I call manufactured urgency—and it has hijacked our nervous systems into a chronic state of fight-or-flight.
This productivity-obsessed paradigm has led to widespread nervous system dysregulation, exhaustion, and burnout. In a fast-paced world that prizes doing over being, patience often feels like a luxury we can’t afford.
But here’s the truth:
Patience isn’t passive. It’s powerful.
What Impatience Reveals About Our Nervous System
Underneath impatience is often a nervous system that is overwhelmed, hyper-vigilant, and under-resourced.
When we’re under chronic stress, we lose access to our ventral vagal state—the part of our nervous system responsible for connection, calm, and creativity. Instead, we default into sympathetic overdrive, stuck in patterns of control, reactivity, and force.
So many of us are simply too fatigued to slow down.
Too overwhelmed to discern facts from noise.
Too depleted to form our own opinions, because the mental and emotional labor of clarity and discernment requires a rested, regulated system.
Add to that the 24/7 flood of notifications, fake news, AI-generated content, and emotionally-charged algorithms—and it’s no wonder we’re stuck in chronic impatience, both with ourselves and others.
The Spiritual Invitation of Patience
When I feel stuck in that loop, I often turn to the mystics. One of the most profound sources of guidance on this topic for me has been Hazrat Inayat Khan, the Sufi master who taught that patience is not just a virtue—it is a spiritual power.
🌿 1. Patience is Strength
“Patience is not only a virtue; it is the greatest power.”
Patience is not weakness or passivity. It’s the strength to trust timing, to hold tension, to surrender the illusion of control.
🌊 2. Patience is the Doorway to Peace
“Patience is the essence of all spiritual attainment.”
True peace begins with the capacity to wait, to listen, and to trust. Without it, the soul becomes agitated and disconnected.
🔥 3. Impatience is Ego in Disguise
Impatience is often ego dressed up as urgency. It’s the voice that says, “Things should be different by now.” It’s a grasping for control when the unknown feels too unbearable.
🌸 4. Growth Takes Time
Like a flower that blooms in its season, we too must trust the organic unfolding of our life path. Pressure does not make the petals open—it only bruises the bloom.
💫 5. Patience is the Practice of the Lover
The Sufi path reminds us that patience is how the lover waits for the Beloved—not with resentment, but with reverence. In love, we give space. In love, we wait without coercion. In love, we surrender to the mystery.
My Personal Journey with Patience
Even after years of spiritual practice, patience remained one of my hardest lessons. It wasn’t until 2019, when my heart cracked open during a deep initiation, that something shifted. Suddenly, I was naturally more patient—not because I was trying, but because I was loving more.
That’s when I realized:
Patience is a byproduct of love.
To love someone is to allow them their timing.
To love yourself is to allow your healing, your growth, your life to unfold on its own sacred clock.
The Path Back to Grace
If you’re noticing that:
- You’re constantly frustrated with your pace or someone else’s
- Your relationships are strained by urgency and pressure
- You’re exhausted and anxious from never feeling “on time”
- You feel disconnected from joy, creativity, or peace…
You’re not alone. And it’s not a personal failure.
It’s a nervous system overwhelmed by a world that demands too much, too fast, too soon.
But there is another way.
When we slow down, reconnect with our breath, open our hearts, and learn to trust time again—we return to the rhythm of life.
To connection.
To wisdom.
To grace.
✨ If you’re ready to reclaim your pace, reset your nervous system, and restore grace in your relationships—apply for a free consultation with me today.
You don’t have to rush.
You just have to begin.
Let’s walk the path of presence—together.
