Worth Waiting For

"Patience may well be thought of as a gateway virtue, contributing to the growth and strength of its fellow virtues of forgiveness, tolerance, and faith." -Robert C. Oaks, The Power of Patience

"Patience is not passive resignation, nor is it failing to act because of our fears. Patience means active waiting and enduring. It means staying with something and doing all that we can—working, hoping, and exercising faith; bearing hardship with fortitude, even when the desires of our hearts are delayed. Patience is not simply enduring; it is enduring well!" -Dieter F. Uchtdorf, Continue in Patience

Now, please.

We live in an on-demand age of instant gratification, an age in which pizza (or, say...Chinese stir-fried noodles?) is delivered to our doorstep in under 30 minutes while we download family pictures or movie files at speeds measured in milliseconds. 

Our world has never moved more quickly.  Our world has never been more efficient, more effective, more up-tempo than (wait for it)...NOW!*  It can be a heady sensation, speeding into the future on this crazy fiber-optic bullet train we call the Digital Age.

If only we could reduce people to 1s and 0s.  Talk about time saving!  Friendship downloaded.  Tender memory app installed.  Shared inside joke scanned and uploaded.  Successfully connected to the wi-fi network "meaningful circle of closely held companions."

It sounds silly, but how often do we inadvertently apply our frantic tech-inspired pace of life to the nurturing and maintenance of even our most treasured relationships?  We complain about a society bereft of emotional intimacy but fail to set aside an hour for a phone conversation with a parent.  We fume when a friend takes an hour to respond to a text.**  We return from a long day at work to immerse ourselves in a smart-phone or netbook screen and occasionally wonder why the attention- and affection-starved spouse on the next couch cushion over fails to truly "get us."

That fact is, while society inculcates us with the premise that our own convenience is the most precious commodity of all, the true gems of mortality, the individuals with whom we have the privilege of building families and friendships, defy temporal convenience. 

Put another way, people and patience go hand in hand.

The holistic, soul-to-soul intimacy that each of us desires from our closest associates, the cherished memories, the shared experiences, the deep mutual appreciation and familiarity that turns a "house" into a "home:" all fruits born from the faithful investment of time, diligence, sincerity, hope...in a word, "patience."

The downloading speeds and the rapidly cooling Chinese noodles can wait.  There's a long conversation on a porch to be had.  A school assignment to be gently, slowly corrected.  A ponderous piano recital to attend.  A surprise dinner to bake.  A sincere letter to write.  

The gift of time to give.

"As the Lord is patient with us, let us be patient with those we serve. Understand that they, like us, are imperfect. They, like us, make mistakes. They, like us, want others to give them the benefit of the doubt. Never give up on anyone. And that includes not giving up on yourself." -Dieter F. Uchtdorf, Continue in Patience

*OK, actually, NOW!

**Well take your circumnavigating time there, Magellan.  No rush.