The Waiting Game:

I suppose you could call me impatient. It depends on my mood, really. There are some days where I'm content to stay in the slow lane, cook my food on the stove and order things online. But sometimes, the only way to make it through the day is to weave in and out of traffic, zap my food in the microwave and stop by a store on the way home. Instant satisfaction. The problem, however, is now I don't want to wait for anything. I want phone calls, texts and emails returned ASAP, no matter what the content is. I want everything now. I'm not very good with delayed gratification. And that, my friends, is part of one of my many theories on why some people (myself included) are overweight. We have been raised in a society that, for the most part, does not encourage having to wait. "Buy now, pay later" they tell us. "Hot and ready pizza" signs scream. Patience is not something you see nowadays. I think we should change that.

I always wondered why "the experts" say to chew and eat slowly. I think I finally get it. When you gulp everything down in 5 minutes, your stomach doesn't have time to get the "I'm full" message to the brain, therefore, you eat until you're stuffed. If you eat slowly, say taking 15 minutes, you notice the "I'm full, stop eating" signal. This takes patience, or, at least, is does for me. I find it very difficult to eat slowly. It's not like I'm at risk of losing my food if I don't eat it all really fast. No one is going to take it from me and I won't get in trouble for leaving food on my plate.

Patience also takes a toll on relationships. You ever wonder why you or your girlfriend, boyfriend, wife, husband or friends get so pissed when you don't return their call, text or email immediately? When people don't want to wait for things, yet are forced to, they get cranky. They get mad because society has been pounding it in to our heads that we shouldn't have to wait for anything. I'm that way with texts. If I know someone is at work, I'm not as impatient, but if I know they're out and about yet I don't get a response in what I deem an appropriate amount of time, I get slightly miffed. For the most part, it is just my overactive imagination that gets me in trouble.

"Why isn't she texting me back? I hope she's ok. Something must have gone wrong. Should I call 911?"

"It's been 4 minutes and I haven't gotten a respnse from him. He must be with someone else."

It's a slippery slope of thoughts that get me in trouble. I'm getting pretty good at pushing those thoughts out of my mind and replacing them with more reasonable ones (Thank God for self help books. Haha).

I've decided to try to become more patient. Delayed gratification is a good thing, no matter what society tells us. Instead of bringing sexy back (JT already did that), I'm bringing patience back. Here are some tips from wikiHow on how to be patient:

1) Try to figure out why you're in such a hurry. Multitasking and tight schedules often lead to losing your patience. Look over your To Do list and see what tasks can be completed by others or at a later time.
2) Figure out what triggers your loss of patience. Stress, worrying and anxiety can all be triggers. Do certain people or situations push your limits? Sometimes writing things down can help ease your mind.
3) When you start to feel impatient, take a minute or two (or three or four or five or...) to just breathe deeply and gather your thoughts.

There are 9 steps and several tips on how to improve patience. I'm going to give it a go this coming week and see how it changes my attitude. Keep your fingers crossed! Patience is not one of my strong points, but I'm going to try it out.