January is coming to a close. This has been a challenging month for me in a couple of ways one of which was not being able to run. It has been almost two months since I ran due to pain in my foot and heel from what I think is plantar fasciitis. Not running leaves me feeling physically and mentally sluggish. I have put heat on my foot, taped it, massaged it, and stretched it. Nothing much is really helping. (And yet am I going to a doctor? Now why would I do that?)
Another challenge has been not knowing where my daughters are going to college and graduate school and being unable to plan a few things that will need to be figured out. They are both waiting on some key things to make their decisions. While I know that everything in the end will work out the way it should, the planner in me likes to have answers.
My daughter’s car had problems…again. We had to take it in and find out that the repairs were once again costly and I was once again wondering how many more things could go wrong in this car.
All of this brings me back to my monthly theme. In my last post I introduced you to my 2024 theme—I Can Make Things Happen. I will be honest and tell you I took my monthly themes straight from my Happy Planner. January is Good Things Take Time. Well, I wish those good things would hurry on up because I am getting a little weary of all of this! Honestly, when I started the month I wondered if I had made a mistake by allowing my new planner to choose my themes instead of me. I wasn’t sure how this was going to be relevant to what I am doing or what was happening. Then last week, it all became clear. As I was having a small Seasonal Affective Disorder-induced breakdown because the car was kind of the last straw, my daughter sat and listened while I cried and just kind of got it all out. Then she said, “Well, you know, mom—good things take time.”
What?? How is this child throwing my mantra for the month at me? It was the reminder that I needed however. What I need to do is be Patient and Persistent. I will admit that patience is not always my strong point. Persistence can also be hard to grasp. Like most people, I am motivated for a while and when you aren’t seeing the results you want, it’s easy to let things start to slip. I looked up a couple of things to better understand these terms and how they can apply to what I am dealing with right now.
The Cambridge Dictionary describes patience as “the ability to wait, or to continue doing something despite difficulties, or to suffer without complaining or becoming annoyed.” Probably the key piece of this for me is “without becoming annoyed.” If you know me, you know I am sarcastic and kind of annoyed by a lot of things. When I lose my ability to wait my anxiety starts creeping up quickly. My response to that is to either push that down nice and deep and instead deal with somatic symptoms such as stomach pain, hives, or cold sores. (Sounds amazing, right?) Or I get very annoyed and crabby.
I need to persist in what I am doing with patience to get the outcome that I want.
Persistence is “to go on resolutely or stubbornly in spite of opposition, importunity, or warning” according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. The way this plays out in my life is not giving up. Siezing opportunities. Believing that if I keep going, I will get what I want in the end.
I think these are two words that we should give consideration to in all things in our lives. Of course, there is a time when we need to stop if we have been working and working and it becomes clear that there is another choice that needs to be made. If I’m running and running and continue to be injured year after year, I should probably consider that high-impact activity is not for me and follow another path.
I will end this post with some quotes I found that really drive home the concepts of Patience and Persistence to me and will probably get posted by my desk.
Patience is not passive waiting. Patience is active acceptance of the process required to obtain your goals and dreams. –Ray Davis
A river cuts through rock not because of its power, but because of its persistence. –James N. Watkins
Wishing you the patience to persist.
Peace from The Edge,
Julia
