Patience, Presence, Practice
My grandmother, who was a librarian, would be proud. Lately, I’ve been doing a lot of reading, something I haven’t done so much since college or even the summers I spent on my grandparents’ farm. Partly, I’m doing it for fun and partly to learn some new things (and it’s also on my list of goals, to read 10 books before I turn 27. I’m almost halfway through my time and I haven’t counted but I’m almost positive I’m one or two books away from my goal).
One of the books I’m working my way through now is Michael Pollan’s Cooked. I’ve been reading it as my wind-down before bed, a practice my wonderful husband started and I’m becoming very attached to. Last night, something in the book about the art of cooking onions jumped out at me.
Properly cooking onions apparently requires patience, presence, and practice. I guess I’ve been doing it all wrong.
I think I might just take these three P’s and turn them into my mantra. Because whether it’s cooking, or photography, or dancing, or singing, or flower arranging, or running, or really any activity at all, it becomes so much more worthwhile when done with patience, presence, and practice.
It occurred to me recently that I spend much of my time wanting to be finished with whatever the thing is I’m doing. I think I was running at the time I had this thought. But wanting to reach the finish line was taking away something from the act of doing it. I hated running because the whole time I was thinking about how much I wanted it to be over (no patience). I wanted it to be over because I had other things to do and it was taking too long because I was moving too slowly (thinking about the future – no presence). I was slow because I didn’t do it very often (no practice).
There’s another quote that I loved in high school and has always stuck with me – happiness is a journey, not a destination. It’s so easy when we’re working on a project or learning something new to just want to reach the destination, to give the destination all of our energy. But then what is the point to doing what it takes to get there? If I have patience with myself and with the process, I am much more likely to enjoy the practice and be present while doing it, which will yield so much more pleasure and value in the experience rather than simply admiring the final project or product.
As I start something new in two weeks (dance classes – something I’ve wanted to do forever), I will repeat this to myself. Patience, presence, practice. When I’m feeling like things with my business aren’t going fast enough – patience, presence, practice.
Life is about experiences. I want to live a life where I truly enjoy them.
