Leopards are beautiful, powerful, graceful, secretive and elusive. They are considered the most remarkable hunters because they are patient in the extreme. They move and stalk with caution and slow precision and when the time is completely right, attack suddenly with explosive determination to capture and retrieve their prey.
Patience is the guardian of all the qualities, it is the mark of maturity and can be the deciding factor in whether you succeed or fail in life. Does the virtue of patience still exist in our society, or is a “quick fix” the catch-phrase of the 21st Century? In our “thirty-different-directions-at-once” world, patience has been replaced by impatience and speed is our new master.
Are you in such a hurry that you also wish there were 40 hours in a day? In fact, sometimes we move at such a dizzying pace that we shoot right past good opportunities and ignore the meaningful things and people in our lives. How much quality time did you spend in the last week with the significant people in your life? Don’t they deserve more of you than this? A patient person never misses a thing and all good things come to those who wait. We often forget that at the bottom of patience one finds heaven. Patience can’t be acquired overnight – you have to work on it.
Living life at dangerous speeds means you have no time to really look, think, observe and strike, like the leopard, at exactly the right time. You need to slow down the train of life; otherwise you might fall off the rails and be flattened!
Adapted from African Wisdom by Dr. Lanette Hattingh
Dear Net Buddies,
Leopards are fast, powerful and a whole lot more. Yet today we are supposed to celebrate their patience.
What do you think about this choice?
Do you think patience is a choice? When or not?
And how about you – do you feel you’ve had a bit too much forced patience in these past six months?
Is it hard to feel like patience is a strength when you don’t have a choice but to live it?
Tell us what you think about patience – we can’t wait to hear it!
Read more about Dr. Lanette Hattingh
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