Patience: Formulas, Stories and Insights

In our world of overnight delivery and instant access to thousands of web sites. Microwaves, instant faxes and coffee. It jiggles our nerves when we find ourselves in a good old fashion line waiting whethere it be on the phone or in person it can be downright annoying. Is this really healthy? Is it good for us to expect things very quickly? What happens to a person who is used to living on very little and earns enough money to live in a small simple basement and buys a comfortable bed? He or she is thirilled and feels great. What about the person used to living in a large home and having lots of comforts who finds themselves losing there job and working in a job that pays much less and has to move into a basement and has a comfortable bed? The person as you guessed is not going to be very happy. How is that possible? The other person in the same living and wage situation is thrilled?? I feel the same is true with our world. When we are blessed with many things that work fast and quick we must look at this as a pure luxury but be able to still live in a slower place world. This will allow us to enjoy the bumps of life which are guaranteed in a better way. This author is fantatic, he is from a very religious background, which actually helps the reader by offering authentic and spiritual based exapmple. There are down to earth inspiring tidibts in all of his books. A gem to read.

Zelig Pliskin is a Rabbi, psychologist and writer who writes works which aim to help us improve our lives. Very often he focuses on a particular quality , in this case ' Patience'. He writes a series of small interesting essays encouraging us to be more patient. In one the 'Ultimate Patience Formula' he tells us that if we repeat the message " I will make the Almighty's will my will " it will help you be more patient. i.e. if you view anything which is happening to you as happening because it is the will of G-d it will make you more patient. In another chapter he teaches ' Don't exaggerate' because exaggeration will make you more impatient. I remember reading this book and feeling that I would in the future better know how to be patient. But today I was impatient most of the day having long ago forgotten the lessons this book taught. Rabbi Pliskin is not to be blamed for my character faults. But there is nonetheless the feeling that ' formulas' tend to work for a time, and then lose their effectiveness. I would also point out in the spirit of Koholet, that there may well be too ' a time to be impatient' . But all this does not take away from the many valuable suggestions in this work which hopefully will make readers have more enjoyable lives through being more patient.

This small book is arranged in 91 short segments--each a couple of small pages in length. I've just finished reading it at bedtime, a couple of segments per night, over a month or two. Very pleasant reading for that hour. The author is an orthodox rabbi, I believe, and the emphasis is often Jewish--as well as other things, too--but really, it's not too heavy on Jewish emphasis, and I suspect that non-Jews, as well as non-religious Jews (I fall into this category), would find this book a very good thing, too. The title tells it all: the book is about the value and methods of developing patience, with each segment having a brief discussion followed by an example or two. I do feel the book has put me in touch with some ethical issues, and some practical issues, and some just plain human issues, involving patientce--all in a way designed to encourage personal growth while also doing good deeds for others.