10 Reps of Patience = Stronger Courage

Patience is NOT my virtue.  Charity and justice?  Absolutely!  Courage?  Giving it my best.  But patience tries my patience.  Even as a child, I received rebukes from my parents and teachers about my lack of the “p” word.

Seems everything surrounding a cancer diagnonsis requires patience.  Meeting with doctors, diagnostic screens and tests, the list goes on.  Following in this “running in place” vein, I now learn that my surgery will not occur until May 31.  I have been assured this will in no way endanger my health, but I feel as though I’ve had cancer forever and it’s eating its way through my body like PacMan.

It occurs to me now, however, that patience is a real test of courage.  It’s far easier to give up than hang in there.  Did you know that designs for the printing press date back to 200 AD, but a modern version didn’t appear until 1439?  Or that the first published design for a submarine was in 1573, but they weren’t used in naval combat until 1776?  Or that light bulb experimentation started in 1802, but the invention of a modern light bulb didn’t happen until 1879?  What if all these inventors, and myriad others, hadn’t been courageous enough to be patient?

Lesson learned – being patient is an exercise in courage.  And the number of reps and sets of patience we perform will only serve to build our courage muscles!