How Yoga Helps You Cultivate Patience

Patience is not just a virtue, it is a requirement in today’s frenetic society. Yoga can help you cultivate and nurture this beautiful quality.

Can You Learn To Be Patient?

Patience is an art form that needs to be practiced, honed and perfected. With constant mindful practice, it can become second nature and gradually your quality. Yoga, as it works out your limitations can help you become more patient too.

Patience Vs Passivity

Patience does not mean passivity. Although they appear to be similar at the outset, there is nothing common between these two. Let’s take a closer look at what this quality is not.

Passivity is a resigned state of the situation. While passivity leads to a disempowered state of mind, patience allows for a dynamic state of acceptance and empowerment. It is the difference between playing the role of a victim and taking charge of a situation.

While it is easy to become passive, being patient in the face of dilemmas is actually far more challenging to cultivate. But is also much more rewarding in the long run. Passivity does not stimulate action but if your patient it forms a stable bedrock for empowered action.

Motivational speaker and author, Dr. Wayne Dyer’s quote on patience reads, “Infinite Patience brings Immediate Results”. What he meant by this is that the fruit of patience is instant joy, peace and calm within us which is ultimately the goal that we seek.

Yoga for Patience – Working with the Limitations of Your Body And Mind

During a yoga session, you are constantly faced with the limitations of your mind and body. In every new pose and every new stretch, one becomes aware of muscles one has never used before. Yoga takes a gentle approach to push past physical limitations.

One has to gradually work with the body and push it past perceived boundaries with patience and care. It is true that the mind poses much greater challenges than the body and has to be dealt with a firm yet gentle and patient hand.

Ralph Waldo Emerson’s quote on patience says – “Adopt the pace of nature, her secret is patience”. This is a trait a gardener, a fisherman or anyone who works intimately with nature understands profoundly. In the case of yoga, you are working to understand intimately your own body and mind. It requires tremendous attention and patience to understand the mechanism of these sophisticated tools.

The Fruits of Being Patient

Patience once cultivated can propel a patient person towards greater goals. As most people struggle with the process of waiting for their labor to bear fruit, one who has learned the art of patience has no problem with this. Since there is no fear of waiting, there are greater chances of finding success. It is possible for us to enjoy the beauty and vivacity of the spring season only because Mother Nature had the patience to wait through winter.

A true yogi is one who has mastered the art of patience. As yoga teaches one to use the mind, body and energies properly, patience is the natural outcome of this balance.