Tag Archives: Patience

23Jun 2011

Choosing to Not Ruin My Lunch

My husband and I have had a weekly lunch date for many years. We enjoy going out together, without the kids, and having uninterrupted conversation. Last year, my husband took a job further away. Unfortunately, we had to alter our ritual. We had to go down to every other week and lately it’s been one time a month! It’s been hard, but with each of us driving 15 minutes there and then 15 minutes back just to meet in the middle, it’s become difficult. However, the time is even more cherished now that’s it’s less frequent.

Last week was a particularly busy week for the both of us. My husband was 30 minutes late in calling me to tell me he was leaving to meet me. While I was waiting, I was afraid to make any calls that I needed to make because I wanted to be ready as soon as he could go. I couldn’t get a hold of him to see what was up. I don’t do well waiting on people and I don’t like people waiting on me. I value my time and others time as well. So this is a button of mine, I know (I’m still re-reading that patience book! lol). But I have to confess, I was FUMING! I had SO much I needed to do. I felt so frustrated as I waited, killing time. After 25 minutes I realized I had wasted all of that time and started to get into doing something. So when he called, I was short and let him know I was not happy.

I am grateful for our 15 minute drive to meet. I was able to have a conversation with myself that went something like this (Yes I was talking to myself- we Therapists call this “self-talk”).

Me to myself: “Oh I am TICKED! I’m gonna let him know when I see him that I am NOT happy! He KNOWS how busy I am. I just blew off a half hour! Do you know how much I could have done in 30 stinking minutes?? We only get to do this once a month now- seriously? Oh I am MAD!! Well he can go get groceries now when he gets off work because I will have to return the calls and emails that I could have just completed during that time. I’m gonna let him know that as soon as I see him!”

This went on for about 5 minutes. Suddenly, I realized I had a choice to change this conversation.

Me to myself: (Deep breath!) “Wait a minute. You have been waiting for this all day. Are you going to be mad and ruin it because he was late? Do you think he really wanted to be stuck in work rather than be with you? Probably not. (But I’m still ticked!) Yeah, so you’re mad. Can you let him know and then get over it so you can enjoy your lunch? Or do you want to ruin the lunch? No, you want to enjoy the lunch. So you have a choice, you can be ticked, let him know, and punish him or you can let him know how you feel, let it go, and enjoy your lunch. It’s not worth it. I’m letting go!”

At that moment, I took some deep breaths and decided I wanted to enjoy the lunch. When I saw my husband, he immediately apologized and explained he was in a meeting that ran over and he had left his phone on his desk so he couldn’t even text me. He then asked how I was doing today. Very calmly I said, “I am frustrated because I had a lot I could of done while I was waiting. I’m disappointed.” He apologized again and I honestly let it go.

I am in no way saying I am the perfect role model of healthy behavior. Sometimes i choose to be angry and ruin my perfect moments. But I have learned from that and I am just giving an example of how we do have a choice in our self-talk and in our behaviors. When our conversations with ourselves are spiraling, we can stop those, too. We can choose to act differently than in the past or how we were taught. How many times do we let perfect moments pass us by just to punish others to show them we are mad? We really punish ourselves, too.

One note about this- I am not in any way saying to use this as an excuse to not tell your partner how you are feeling. I did tell my husband how I felt, I just chose to not make a big issue out of it. It was a mistake and there was nothing he could have done about it. So I let it go. There are times when issues need to be discussed further. This just wasn’t one of them.

I am so glad I chose, at least on this day, to let my husband know how I felt and then let it go. We had a great lunch together.

Thank you for reading this rather lengthy blog today. I hope you CHOOSE to have a great day!

*Natalie Chandler, MA, LMHC is a therapist at Imagine Hope Counseling Group. Natalie enjoys doing marriage counseling, individual counseling, and couples counseling.  We also specialize in family counseling, child, and adolescent counseling. Imagine Hope serves the Indianapolis area including the surrounding areas of Carmel, Fishers, Noblesville, Westfield, and Zionsville.

18May 2011

The Power of Patience

As a parent, do you ever feel like you are doing a juggling act? I often feel like I have 6 balls in the air (my 3 kids, my husband, my home, and my career). If someone throws a ball in the mix, I can feel pretty anxious pretty fast.

I saw this unfold this weekend as we were balancing soccer games, birthday parties, playdates, church, and did I mention rest (isn’t that what the weekends are for? lol). I had a couple balls, actually curve balls, thrown into my juggling act. It really threw me off big time.

Because of the extra balls I forgot snacks and toys to distract the little ones at the bigger one’s soccer games (sorry kiddos!). I dressed my children up in pirate costumes to show up to a birthday party that wasn’t until next week (sorry Teri!). And I said some things to my husband that I probably shouldn’t have said because of my frustration (sorry Cary!). Oh what a weekend.

After having a much needed lunch with my BFF yesterday, I did feel a breath of fresh air and some semblance of my life coming back.
For a minute, I put the balls down, exhaled, and laughed!

However, this morning as I drove into work, I noticed some aftermath of my disrupted juggling act. Like a roll of thunder 20 minutes after a storm passes, my anxiety over the weekend started back up. I started driving in a hurry, becoming impatient and angry with other drivers, and feeling very unpleasant. After 15 minutes of this I realized this was a familiar feeling that I didn’t like!

I remembered back to when this was my way of life, EVERYDAY! I used to be so impatient and full of frustration and anger. I rarely felt peace and when I did, it was so uncomfortable that I would quickly find something to be impatient about.

Until a few years ago. I chose to make a change and become more patient. I had always prayed that I would have more patience. Why wasn’t it delivered? That’s a nice thing to pray for- It wasn’t praying for new shoes or a new purse- I was praying for patience for goodness sake!

Then I heard a speaker say, “We actually all have peace and patience inside us. We were created to be that way. We just have to learn to practice it and it will come out in our behaviors”.

I really took this to heart and began studying how I could have these behaviors. I read one of the best books I’ve ever read. It’s called “The Power of Patience” by M.J. Ryan.

Typically when I read a book with short chapters I devour it in a day. I decided to make myself read only one chapter per day. This sounds silly but it was really difficult for me. However, it was a good practice in patience. With this book, some major prayer, and some major discipline in my behaviors, I have become more patient.

I am so grateful I did this before I had kids. We all know they require so much patience on a good day!

I encourage each of you to pick up a copy of this book, whether you are a parent or not. It can really help you access patience and experience more peace in your life.

As for me, today I pulled my copy off my bookshelf, blew off the dust, and started my first chapter…again. We all need a little booster from time to time, right? Thank you for reading!

*Natalie Chandler, MA, LMHC is a therapist at Imagine Hope Counseling Group. Natalie enjoys doing marriage counseling, individual counseling, and couples counseling. We also specialize in family counseling, child, and adolescent counseling. Imagine Hope serves the Indianapolis area including the surrounding areas of Carmel, Fishers, Noblesville, Westfield, and Zionsville

16Mar 2010

Anger, Speeding, and Patience is a Virtue

Today as I was taking my son to school, I noticed in my rear view mirror a woman who looked very angry and was talking/yelling, either to herself or to me. I was driving cautiously but not horribly slow- we were, after all, making a turn to get on the interstate with a huge semi in the other lane making the turn as well. I was being cautious. I thought to myself, “Wow- she needs to read our group blog this week on signs of Hidden Anger! Or maybe not- she wasn’t hiding it very well!” As we got on the interstate, she immediately crossed 2 lanes of traffic to go around all of us to get into the fast lane and sped away.

My son and I drove the speed limit, even though it was tempting not to. We were running behind today. We were driving maybe 5-6 miles down the road when I saw police lights ahead. As we passed I noticed the cute little silver Infiniti that had sped around us being pulled over by the officer. Ok, I am really sharing my unprofessionalism here when I tell you this. I said out loud but not with the window down, “Yayyy! See ya later!” My son asked who I was talking to. I said, “Remember the lady who sped by us earlier that Mommy said needed to slow down? There she is, being pulled over by the police officer!” I then explained to him how Mommy shouldn’t be happy because the lady got pulled over but that I was happy the officer was there to remind her she needed to slow down!” (wink wink)

I explained to him in a 5 year-old way that sometimes when you hurry, it ends up taking you longer. Slow down and be patient. I started thinking about how easy it is when we are angry to lose sight of that.  Anger takes on a life of its own inside us and breeds nasty behaviors like impatience, yelling at people unnecessarily, and just down right rudeness! But life always catches up with us in one way or another, whether it is a police officer pulling you over, or your dr. telling you that you are a risk for a heart attack.

It is important to keep our anger in check. Check out this week’s group blog on signs of Hidden Anger and see if you relate to any of them. Thank you for taking the time to read my blog, Have a great week!

*Natalie Chandler, MA, LMHC is a therapist at Imagine Hope Counseling Group. Natalie enjoys doing marriage counseling, individual counseling, and couples counseling.  We also specialize in family counseling, child, and adolescent counseling. Imagine Hope serves the Indianapolis area including the surrounding areas of Carmel, Fishers, Noblesville, Westfield, and Zionsville.