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Facing Your
Situation
(The Role of Patience and Discipline)
-
Oliver Mbamara
“…By patience he can endure life, hardships, karmic burdens, the slanders of men, and the pricks of pain and disease. He keeps his mind steadfastly upon the Light of God, never swerving, never letting up on his attention to the goal of God-Realization.” –
The Shariyat-Ki-Sugmad, Book One, pg. 101
One evening, I had a deadline to meet, but then that type of experience that comes forth every now and then to test one’s patience and one’s endurance was mine to have. My expensive digital camera was missing. I had to print a document in the next few hours or I would miss a deadline but my printer would not print. I went to my car to look for the camera and then I noticed that I had a flat on one of the tires. That meant I would not be able to deliver the document with my car even if I finally print it.
When I narrated my ordeal to my brother, he told me a story about an experience in his life in which “God was asking him to slow down.” I took his advice in good stride, but I mentioned to him that I thought I already slowed down coupled with the fact that I was on vacation from my regular job. The mind is fond of such logic.
The next day I went and bought a new printer, but then the installation kept coming up with error signals. Unhappy with the situation, I did a haphazard job of trying to fix the problem but it was to no avail. The next day, I quickly returned the printer to the store blaming the very rough shape of the carton/box. The sales person agreed to change it but warned me that I would not be allowed to bring it back again if the trouble continued, because it would mean that the problem lay with my computer. When I got home and tried to install the second printer, I ran into the same error problem like the first one.
The statement of the salesperson was repeating itself in my head – “you can’t return it again…the problem would be from your computer.” I had to think of an alternative than returning the printer. Controlling my frustration, I decided to patiently read the manual. Then I learnt that I could go online and study the troubleshooting text. In my desire for a shorter approach to solve the situation, I had ignored the same instruction in the manual though I read it earlier. It took me two days of frustrated effort and failed attempt at the “quick fix” approach before I decided to readdress my approach and patiently follow the guiding instructions. Once online, it took me only a few minutes to spot the exact problem and follow the correction instructions to get the printer running perfectly.
Many times, life would give us a chance to pause and apply the necessary discipline required to deal with our situation(s). Yet, many times we would be in a hurry to solve the same problem but we only end up spending more time than necessary trying and failing to fix the same problem. This applies to many departments of our lives – jobs, friendship, relationship, family, community, and etc. When faced with a situation in our job or in a relationship for instance, we often seek the seeming shortest way out (separation, divorce, resignation, legal action, etc) because we refuse to face our situations, acknowledge our mistakes, and squarely deal with them. We leave one job, or relationship, or community, for another, hoping to get a better one but then the same problem in the old one comes up again in the new one. Rather than face it we blame others and scurry off yet into another job, relationship, community, etc. but because the problem is unresolved, it follows us to our next port of call – a new relationship, a new job, a new apartment, a new community, etc.
As the new calendar year approaches or begins, many of us are already drawing up our new list of resolutions and a closer look at our lists would reveal an item (or two) that is being repeated. What happened? We did not supply or maintain the patience, discipline, and perseverance needed to see such resolution through. So, here again we are, adding it (them) to our list once again. With just a little more patience and discipline, we could have been through with such matter in the first place, just like I would have succeeded with my first printer in the first place if I had approached the problem with a little more patience and the discipline of reading and following the manual instructions.
The choice is up to the individual. He could continue to point accusing fingers at others claiming that he is the innocent victim, or he could pause for a while to read the signs and re-evaluate his role in the whole setup. Until he does, the situation would continue to pop up in his life in different guises and circumstances, here and there, year after year, and time and again. This is only my understanding, and I am still learning.
The Return of The Past
To the worldly man in worldly living
Comes the demands of daily troubles.
Like a character imbibed so well,
He may from contention shy away
Ignoring the tenets of simple patience
He disregards the gains of discipline
With a quick concession of character
He tows the footsteps of shorter routes
He engages the easy way he finds
And scurries off with a false escape
To the newness of a next port of call
A new job, residence, mate, or so
But no sooner than he settles down
Comes calling again his then past woe
Repeating itself in his new life too
Though disguised with a new face now.
And until the day he wisely chooses,
To cry no more like a victim, and
To point no more accusation fingers
These events will again come popping.
©Oliver O.
Mbamara, 2004
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Oliver Mbamara is an Administrative Law
Judge with the State of New York. He is also a filmmaker and a Published
Poet and playwright. For more on Oliver, please visit
www.olivermbamara.com
For background/research reference on this
piece, click on this link
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