You're listening to Take Out Therapy with your host, Rebecca Hunter. If you're into personal growth and fascinated by the human condition like I am, stick with me. In the next few minutes, I'll break down a common personal growth topic and give you some straightforward ideas for change.
I'm a private practice therapist and online mental health educator, so I see a lot of popular topics both in and out of the therapy office that we all struggle with. I'm here to help with that. This podcast is not a substitute for therapy, but rather the musings of a therapist and an opportunity for information and a little bit of help.
Okay, let's get to work. Hello, my friend. Thank you so much for stopping by today.
Today I want to talk about the idea of impatience, that feeling that things are just not ever moving fast enough. And yet it's interesting because there's always an intensity and speed to life, and sometimes it's really unbearable. It's very weird, but I find a lot of the time that I'm feeling very impatient with people, with my daily tasks, and the general state of the world.
I just have this quiet impatience. Can we get this over with? Do you ever feel like if you could just slow down, things might feel differently? Yeah, me too. So let's talk about how we can slow down a little bit and become more patient and really be able to be in the moment.
In 2020, I basically set a theme word, and the theme word is patience, because I'm incredibly impatient. And I've been really taking a look at this the last couple of years, actually. And so I set this theme, and the way it works in my life when I set an intention or a theme, I just allow it to come up naturally, and then I sort of do some work around it.
So it's funny, because patience comes up a lot, since I set that intention. Things will be going wrong, and I'll think patience, and I'm like, oh, okay. This is one of those things where I'm being really impatient, and I'm impacting the situation badly, or this situation is impacting me badly, right? So impatience definitely comes up a lot for me, and it's actually been kind of interesting to see just how pervasive my low level of patience is in my life and the places where it shows up.
Today, I was just getting some things done around the house, and I had gotten a lamp, and I decided to put it together, and I was just bee-bopping along today. No real goal, I just was kind of doing a few things around the house. So no time constraints or anything like that, and I was putting this lamp.
It's one of those crappy Walmart torch lamps that you can buy. They're really cheap, and I just wanted to have a little bit of light in the corner in the studio, and I screwed all the little pulls together. Anyways, I've always had trouble putting together these lamps, people.
I have a skill deficit in screwing one thing into another thing, and I'm sorry, but that's just my language today. I just have a skill deficit there. I don't know what to tell you.
So anyways, I was trying to put this lamp together and really jamming the pieces in and trying to hurry up with it, and then I was like, oh, this right here is where patience would be super helpful, because then I could slow down and stop jamming the pieces into each other and ruining this thing. And it's interesting, because I see impatience with the process. Whatever the process is, show up in therapy sessions, in my friends' lives, in all the things.
We're not very patient. We're just rushing from one thing to the next. This need to hurry and finish, hurry to start, get to the next thing.
It's this need to, I don't know, I think it's a need to distract from what's actually happening, because maybe we don't want to be doing what's actually happening, and it's like this, let's get on with it already, and we race our way through our lives at top speed. We're not present. We're in the future.
We're in a trance, as Tara Brock would say, and I totally agree with it, because when you're being impatient, if you really stop and notice that you're being impatient, you're like, oh, I'm sorry, I'm being impatient. Or you apologize to yourself for being impatient, hopefully, but we don't often slow down enough to notice impatience, and so I just want to point out here that it's a problem. That's why I'm talking about it.
I'd like to talk to you about things that cause us bigger problems over time, and if we become this very impatient person, then the problem is both internal and external. Internally, impatience is a pretty good sign of an elevated nervous system. It's basically like our brains are on overdrive.
It's stress and anxiety and depression and other words we use to mean freaking overwhelmed. We're always trying to get to the next thing. Our world, our culture has set us up a bit, hasn't it? We live in a way too fast-paced environment.
I believe I've pointed that out in the past, right? And so that environment affects our level of patience, which is a sign that our nervous system is elevated. I'm popping in here to interrupt myself because I want to tell you quickly about an opportunity I'm offering. As an anxiety specialist, I can tell you that anxiety is on the rise, my friend.
Stress, overwhelm, and overthinking are just the tip of the iceberg. I know. I'm seeing it in my office, in the world.
I'm sure you're seeing it too. I want to invite you, if you are suffering with any of these things, to go to your doctor to watch a 30-minute teaching session I did on how to heal anxiety. At the very least, it will give you ideas for change, and at best, you'll leave with a clear roadmap to ditching anxiety for good.
I tell you some of the things that will work against you because I see the same mistakes all the time in my office, and I'll give you concrete ideas about specific things you can do to get your life back. Because here's the deal. Medication does not heal anxiety, and neither does therapy.
We do. Access the session at rebeccahuntermsw.com slash healing-anxiety. The link is right in my show notes.
Okay. Back to the episode. So here's the deal.
We don't need to be impatient. We can't get just as much done if we chill out a little bit, and sometimes, I would say, we could get more done if we chill out a little bit. Have you ever heard the expression, aloha? The Hawaiian culture has a vibe.
It's just a vibe. I don't know how to describe it. If you've never been there, it's the most relaxed.
Everything is totally fine, and unpleasant things are actually quite pleasant. That's the vibe. The music over there goes with it.
The feeling of it is complete chill. It's aloha. We need some aloha.
Impatience is not good for us physically. Because if impatience is a sign that our nervous system is elevated, that means that our body is dealing with that, and it can't rest and repair. So our system needs to rest in order to repair itself.
The human body is amazing. We can heal all kinds of things, all the things. Everything from emotional distress and trauma, the body can help us heal.
We can heal from an illness. Our body, when it is in resting stage, that's when our immune system works really well, and our digestive system. So our body needs to rest in order to do its thing.
And that means it needs to rest in order to be physically and mentally healthy. So you do not want to sustain an elevated nervous system. And so back to impatience and how that fits in.
Impatience is basically a lack of presence. We're not present. We're letting our brains, right, this, like, oh, I got to get this done so I can get to the next thing, I wish this person would stop talking, right? We're letting our brains and our elevated nervous system run our lives, okay? And being impatient, it leads to all kinds of problems.
It leads to disconnection with the people that we love. I don't know about you, but the people in my life never appreciate me when I'm being impatient with them, right? And we make mistakes. We forget things, right? We don't see the opportunities, you know? I mean, I can't count the number of times people were like, oh, you know, I waved at you at the Rose Hours, but I guess you didn't see me.
And I'm like, yeah, because I am the most impatient person at the grocery store ever. Doesn't mean I don't want to see people. It's that I'm like, oh, I got to hurry up, and my nervous system's all jacked up.
So I really have to work hard on being patient about my grocery shopping, my friend, right? When we're impatient, we don't see the opportunities for connection. And then most importantly, we're not at rest. The system in an elevated state, like impatience, is not at rest, and that's not good.
So let me give you some ideas about how to practice patience right now in your life. And maybe you can have a 2021 patience-themed year. No, I'm just kidding.
The goal here is for us all to just notice impatience. It's such an unproductive and, like, uncomfortable, I mean, it's tight, impatience. It feels bad, and it causes us problems.
So when you notice it, just try to release it through a bit of mindfulness practice, just slowing down and noticing what the heck you're actually engaged in. And I won't go into a big lesson about mindfulness, because I'm going to give you some ideas about where to practice patience, but I will tell you that sometime in December, I'm going to have a three-day mindfulness challenge. So I will give you some news about that as soon as I have it.
You can go to my website to find out more information. So I want to give you an idea of some areas to practice patience. Lamp assembly is a great place to practice patience.
Everyday tasks, my friend, when you're putting things together, when you're taking things apart, right? Everyday tasks that you don't like or that you have a dialogue about. You know, the dialogue like, oh, I have to put this lamp together. Oh, I have to get this done.
So notice if you're patient when you're doing those things, like laundry, you know? For me, a place to practice patience, and maybe you'll relate to this, is in line. Is in line. When I, you probably know if you've been listening to me for more than one episode that I hate grocery shopping and I hate lines.
So in 2020, I have really worked hard to practice patient in the line. And I have to say, I'm pretty good at it. Okay? So in lines is a great place to practice.
And then also driving, right? So those are all kind of activities where we get pretty impatient. Like a lot of people get impatient on the road. What's up with that? Why not just leave five minutes earlier and practice patience? It's just a practice, right? And then the other thing is like, we can practice patience in our relationships.
Being impatient with our kids when they're telling us the most boring story about Minecraft or some other silly adventure, imaginary, not real thing. Always made me feel so impatient. And I think I missed out on a lot, to be honest.
I'll just be straight up with you and say like, when I was at the height of my anxiety, impatience was such a huge part of that. And I missed so much. Like I could not be present and engage with my kids.
So notice when you're with your kids or you're with old people, or if you're on a walk with your dog, like if your dog's anything like mine, Lily walks slower than me. So I have to wait for her when we go on walks. So imagine my impatience with her.
Like, come on. Yeah. So just notice.
Notice where you find yourself being impatient and see if you can use a little bit of mindfulness. I'll teach you if you don't know how to do it. Slow down and release the impatience.
Pay attention to what you're doing. I will be here with you doing the work just like always. So here's the deal.
If you like the podcast, it really helps this project. If you subscribe, it really helps. If you send it along to a couple friends that might need this information, and it really helps if you keep listening because we need more mental health education, my friend, that's what I'm doing here.
I have a lot of unpaid content like this that I put out, but I also have two paid programs. One is for people who want to stop overthinking everything to death. It's very cheap.
And I also have an in-depth program for anxiety recovery. So if you want to dig into some work with me, you can find me at rebeccahuntermsw.com. That's an MSW because I have a master's in social work. And yes, I'm a therapist, but this show is not to be meant as therapy.
It's education. Thanks for being here.
