Today I want to talk about one of my least favorite subjects - Patience. I really don't like the development process for patience but it is a very important quality. Now as I have said before, I consider myself to be a pretty good guy. Many times when I write, I tell you about something that happened in my life that hurt or something I did wrong. I do this because I want to try to help someone see a better way to think, live, be, do things. Hopefully, the people who really know me understand that I actually think pretty highly of myself. I think I am a good guy that has a lot going for himself. Am I conceited? I don't think so because I don't think that I am better than others, I just think I am a good guy.
That said, I want to discuss another of my character flaws today. In certain areas of my life I am extremely impatient. Most of you have heard me refer to the blog I wrote on the Box. I think it is the blog that has revolutionized my thinking more than any other I have written. In the Box, I discussed a different way to find a dating relationship. My thought (and I believe it is the right way) was that we should find people that we really enjoy being around. Start with being a friend and looking for a great friend in return. What if I got to know her on the inside? What if the first thing I noticed was her heart and how helpful she was to others instead of a body part? What if I appreciated the little things she does for me and really learned her instead of really learning how to get in her pants? What would that look like. I believe it will look like a relationship that is deep. I believe it will look like a relationship that books and movies can be written about. Do I think movies are realistic? Most of the time certainly not. But what would it look like to go deep? Guys, we stop way short of the good stuff about a woman and we are stupid for doing it.
Ladies this stupidity goes both ways though. What if you looked for a man that was more concerned with taking care of your emotional needs than your physical ones? What if you decided to wade out into the water a little and find a guy who really cares about you as a person and not just finding a guy that can take you to nice dinners or buy you cool stuff? What do you think would happen if you did this? You might wake up and find that you are in something worth having. It might be something really special. See, like I have said before, the girl I want is five more minutes. What do I mean? I want to be with a girl who is so special that when I wake up next to her in the morning, all I can do is stare. Knowing that I have to get up and go run, read my bible and go to work, I want to be so in love that I just have to stare and be with her for five more minutes. If I find that, I will have found real treasure.
So you might want to jump to the quick conclusion that I have to be patient as I wait for this girl to come into my life. That is certainly true but not complete. Now in my life, the Lord has blessed me and I can really do just about anything I want in my free time. This is really a blessing but it has caused me an unforeseen problem at the same time. I don't have to be patient for most things. So it was very easy for me to get impatient and want a relationship in microwave fashion. As most of you know I am recently divorced and I signed up for a couple of online dating things. Part of the reason I did this was because I was wanted to date (not at all like I said in the Box huh). But even as I filled out the profiles, I knew in my heart of hearts that I was doing the wrong thing. The Lord was constantly arresting me telling me I was making a mistake. So, almost as quickly as I started, I came to a screeching halt on those things. I deleted both of them. Now, I am not saying that there is anything wrong with online dating because I don't believe that there is. I am just pointing out that the Lord was telling me it was wrong for me.
The problem for me with patience is that in order for a friendship to blossom into a relationship, it takes time. You can't microwave a friendship or it will be like a plant that starts to grow but never has deep roots. If you look at a tree, the root ball can be bigger and go much deeper than the tree you see on top of the ground. So when you don't think you see any growth, just wait. Because that relationship may just be growing roots. You can't see those. The don't look like kissing or holding hands but they are the backbone of a successful relationship. For me this has been a very difficult process. While I know it is the right way to do things, it doesn't make it any easier.
The other thing that makes this process so extremely difficult are people. As a good friend of mine so pointedly noticed the other night, I don't have a lot of dating experience. This is a very true statement. Here is something I discovered about the dating world since I became single that makes my whole theory harder. Both men and women want to get to the physical part of a relationship too quick. I thought it was just guys but it's not. It's both. See, I think the thought process is if we aren't physical, he isn't interested and I will have to move on to the next guy.
I talked to a friend just recently. She told me about dating a guy who didn't immediately try to get physical with her and how she struggled with the concept. She said she was so used to having guys trying to move into a physical relationship that when a guy actually tried to talk to her and get to know her, she wasn't sure how to handle it. She told me that they spent hours on the telephone just talking and it is great. That was a different type of patience that she had to learn. Just because a guy isn't all over you within the first two weeks you date doesn't mean he is a bad guy. It might just mean that he is a great guy who actually respects you as a person not as a make out machine. Imagine the concept!
So let me try to wrap this up. For me, one of the hardest things I had to learn is patience, especially in relationships. This concept caused me much grief and several sleepless nights but the rewards are worth the effort. On the other hand, ladies you have to learn a different type of patience. If you find a guy who isn't all over you, it's possible that he is the real deal. It's possible that he just might be someone worth taking a little time to get to know better. Maybe he is a guy that will actually treat you the way you want to be treated.
And that's another Opinion of the Minion
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