Why we are impatient

When the matrix board above my lane starts to flicker and the brake lights come on, my impatient, dark side starts to rant. I'm a bad person in traffic jams, but waiting is not a hobby of mine anyway. I always choose the wrong line at the checkout with just a pack of coffee, call an overloaded customer service at impossible times (and you should know that I once recorded such a thing myself, sorry for that) and I'm a bad person when I have to deal with slow people. Then I only think of two words and nine letters: d.u.u.r.t. l.a.n.g.

A poll from Psychologie Magazine shows that I am not a loner. People are quickly impatient, especially when it comes to annoying behavior. Talking without making a point ranks number one with 66 percent, being slow takes a solid second place with 58 percent (ha!) and complaining completes the top three with 42 percent. Yes, I completely recognize myself in that. Sometimes I still look at a moving mouth, but I have no clue what they are actually babbling about.

How come? Being impatient has everything to do with how you feel at a moment and actually very little with character (unless you were born as an impatient dodo, because they exist). If I have spent three days with the most fun girls in Paris (think wine and late nights) and have driven quite a few kilometers with the Renault , then it might just be that I am a little bit in a yawning state. And in times of being tired, patience shrinks. The busier you are, the more intensely you react to irritations and the more impatient you become.

Not strange, because everything has to be now, immediately, directly, on the spot. If you call, someone must pick up. If you get on the train, it must bring you to your destination within the calculated time, if you make an appointment, people must arrive on time. Because time is money and hello, you don't have that (I'm talking about precious hours here, you know). Are you still following? Exactly the point, because we may have cultivated a bit of our own impatience. Everything is going faster, so is the depletion of our patience.

But patience is actually so good for you. If the dinner with my dearest friend doesn't go ahead, I feel really down. But the week after that, I am extra-extra-extra happy. If you have patience, you are also more successful in your work and just in life itself. And you focus less on those annoying, trivial, irritating, and especially small things in the day. I'm telling you... Two words, nine letters: have patience.

Source: Psychologie Magazine