Patience Is That Of Which I Cannot Have Enough
If patience were a substance of which I could somehow hoard, I would selfishly acquire, at almost any cost, as much as I possibly could. The kind of take no prisoners kind of free for all kind of hoarding. The kind of ransack rob at gunpoint violent kind of sacking we could only imagine should the same thing be sought as if it were a stack of tickets to a distant space station on the eve of an earthly cataclysm kind of no holds barred grab all. But amidst all this man-eat-man frenzied imagination of pure beastly “the stronger will survive” mentality and fiction, I have good cause to sit back, patiently, and relax.
Patience, gladly, is no such substance. It is something I can hoard as much of as I can create myself. It is a product of my own will. Ironically, this non-substance is the one substance that can lend a greater satisfaction to the acquisition of all other substances. Like stock market gains. Personally, being patient with the stock market can actually be agonizingly painful. Look, I’ve got things to do, places to go. Does anyone else feel this way?
Forcing myself to wait through the grind of a losing stock, then trying to prohibit myself from selling it the moment it turns good, or even holding a slow but steadily gaining one all the while really wanting it to pick up the pace a little; these can be rather aggravating. Keeping a cool head, maintaining moderation, and remembering that too much too fast is doom through and through, are all obstacles that good traders simply must overcome. Patience, in abundance, is the tool with which to do it. If I had enough to bathe in, a soak indeed I would take. Twice daily. My big complaint is that the stock market just isn’t as industrious as I am or try to be. Mostly, I’m always on the go. The stock market idles too much, is boring, twiddles thumbs when I would be producing, creating or learning. If the stock market was a person, I would accuse him or her of being lazy, wasteful. Pathetic.
It’s just that that helps bring me patience. Far from being a person, it’s just a natural element in our midst. Being impatient with it is ultimately as useful as tapping one’s foot with the rising tide. Complain all you want. Bitch like hell too. Nothing I or anyone does will make it do anything other than what it’s going to do. That changes everything. I should have left my boat farther out. Or I should have timed things better. These are my responsibilities. These are things I control.
Far from being impatient, now I am forced to be more thoughtful, or at least to recognize the limitations of the system with which I participate. I can stop some of that foot tapping, watch glancing, and portfolio checking. I can go stretch my legs, read a book, or go out for a coffee. I can be a little patient. In fact, I can hoard as much of it as I want.