Patience & Tolerance

January 10, 2025

Patience & tolerance were important ideals during the time of the stoics. Today these values are equally important. Marcus Aurelius had some thoughts on this topic.

Tolerance & Patience with Others

Reading this quote really makes me reflect on the times I have fallen short of these principals. I can think of many examples where my intolerance has negatively affected me in work and family situations.

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As a parent I have memories of situations where I could have been more patient and tolerant with my son and daughter. These memories both shame and motivate me to be a better person, to be a better Father.

The risk here for parents who either can’t or won’t learn to be patient and tolerant is that you run the risk of changing forever how your children view you as a person. We have all heard of kids cutting off contact with their parents. This happens for good reasons, and being an intolerant asshole is definitely one of them.

Professionally you also run the risk of forever being labelled an jerk or worse. I can think of at least two work associates who were perpetually going off the rails and being impatient. It forever tarnished how I viewed professionally.

The personality mode once cast can be a very difficult thing to change.

Holding Yourself to a Standards

Thus brings me to the later part of what Marcus was saying – strictness with self. The thing I love about those part of the quote is that it can be applied to one’s own tolerance but every other aspect of life as well.

⊕A hallmark 2009 study on habit creation found that habits developed in a range of 18 to 254 days; participants reported taking an average of about 66 days to reliably incorporate one of three new daily activities Scientific American (2024, January 24). How Long Does It Really Take to Form a Habit? Retrieved January 10, 2025. You have to be fastidious and strict to form good habits. They just don’t happen without active involvement on the part of the person seeking to form the habit. It takes time to form a habit.

I have many examples in my life where I started down a path of improvement but didn’t give it enough time to form a habit only to have myself slide back into old ways that in some cases were negative habits that I had formed over time.

Weight loss is one such example that I think a lot of people can relate to. You commit to healthy eating, improving your excerise and maybe even achieve your goals, only to find yourself back at your original weight or worse because you weren’t strict enough to maintain the new way of approaching the aspects of your life that govern your weight.

Reflection & Commitment

In closing, being tolerant and patient with others is an important goal for personal self improvement. Additionally being aware of our personal failures can provide an opportunity to reflect on areas where we have failed. And lastly, repetition is the key to building lasting habits. Don’t stop too soon or your hard work could end up being wasted.