What does being patient with yourself mean? What does it mean to you? Have you tried to change something about yourself, or develop a new habit, but find yourself never measuring up to your own standards? Or is follow-through a problem? Well, this is what I am working on improving right now: developing patience with myself while pushing myself.

I know you all know what patience is, but I always find it easy to be patient with others, but not with myself. It is always my thought that if I want to do something, I should be able to do that. If I can’t, then I lose patience with myself by quitting. Or, more often than not, I just keep trying the same thing everyday expecting a different result without doing anything any different. Change doesn’t work that way, and this is where the patience with yourself comes in.

If I want to set a goal to get up at 5am every morning to work out, cook breakfast, etc, I just put 5am on my calendar everyday. I plan out my morning, and expect that my morning will be perfect. Until morning comes at 5am when my alarm goes off. I snooze until 6am, and then get up. By then it is time to get ready for work, so no workout, no breakfast….you get my point. Am I the only one who does this!!???

The goal is to be patient enough with myself in a way that I don’t become too lax with myself. I still want to be motivated and driven, but not unreasonable with myself. Rome wasn’t built in a day, as they say, and being patient with yourself can’t be done in a day either. I often find myself thinking that I should be able to do it all. Being realistic is the thread that ties the fine balance between patience and motivation.

Think of a tug of war rope. On one end of the rope is patience and the other is motivation. The center is where realistic is. If you pull the rope too much towards the motivation side, you lose that patience with yourself by expecting too much from yourself. If you pull too much to the side of patience, you find you don’t have any push (or motivation), therefore being too lax. You want to keep the rope in the center of the realistic goal. This allows for you to both push and pull back and forth. When you start to see yourself going too far in one direction, let up a little bit, and re-center yourself.

This is a great exercise in reconnecting yourself back to your center. When you feel overwhelmed, frustrated, impatient, or unmotivated, simply re-center by finding that balance. Ask yourself: Where am I pulling too much? Where am I pushing too much? What is my ultimate goal and how can I get back to that center?

Sometimes just slowing down, being quiet, and being calm, brings you back to that realistic center. If you really want to do it, figure out what you can do, and let that be your all. Your “all”. won’t be the same as someone else’s “all”. No two people will ever have the same “all”. This is what I am discovering about myself. What I can do, will not be the same someone else can do. But if you remain in that center, you will realize that you are giving everything you can in a balanced approach, and that is enough.

It’s little by little. Slow and steady. Ebbs and flows. Balance and re-centering. Content.

In thinking about this, I also thought about how if we are patient with someone, it means we are calm and know that something might take some time over a period of time. By displaying patience, we are not getting upset with someone or something. We are allowing for whatever it is to evolve, a solution to be found, or for a trying period.

So, think about this today or maybe journal about how you can be more patient with yourself. Remember to give yourself grace, but also with a little nudge. Remember, finding balance is the key here.

Have a beautiful day! Share in the comments below how you find this balance, or where you are struggling.