Lev Lazinskiy

Patience

Last night was a very enlightening night for me. I finished reading “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.” By Steven R. Covey. And the last chapter of that book is what really hit home with me. It dug deep into interpersonal communication and personal development. Here are a few quotes from the book that I found to be extreemly useful:

“When you exercise your patience beyond your past limits, the emotional fiber is broken, nature overcompensates, and the next time the fiber is stronger.”

This basically says that the same way our bodies become stronger when we go past our limits our emotions can do the same thing. I think I truly believe in that. I am given an opportunity as we speak to test that theory. But throughout my life I have found that once you hit “rock bottom.” or a place where you say to yourself. . . “this cannot possibly get any worse.” Then that becomes the standard to which we judge all of our experiences in the future.

For example, if my friend told me that he would give me a phone call back, and I patiently waited for that phone call which never came. Then my natural response would be to get upset about the whole situation and make speculations on the reasons why that phone call was never made. I would begin to think of horrible things, or dishonest behavior. Blow the whole thing out of proportion. But, If I practice patience and wait for the issue to resolve itself. Then 9 times out of 10 there is a reasonable and legitimate explanation for that. In the future when I have to wait patiently for something I will think back to this occasion and say to myself.. " I once waited 8 days for a phone call. If I can do that then I can do anything."

Another portion of the book talked about the “Daily Private Victory.” I really like this Idea because it makes every day seem worthwhile. If you do something each day to benefit your life Physically, Mentally, Socially, or Spiritually then you are constantly actively living and bettering yourself.

The last portion of the book that I really enjoyed was the part about communication. How real communication does not involve superficial things like events. (i.e. - “How was your day.” ) It involves emotions, ideas, and feelings that cause both people involved in that communication to learn from each other but most importantly learn from themselves.