Starting a business can be an exhilarating experience. However, it can get a little discouraging if you aren’t getting the desired results. Most business owners want their businesses to become overnight successes, but that usually doesn’t happen. Building a successful business typically involves a lot of planning, staying disciplined toward your goals, and, you guessed it – patience.
As you start to develop more patience, you may find yourself more resilient and determined to enjoy the process of business ownership. In addition, becoming more patient can teach you to be more grateful for the progress you’ve made.
So, if you’re struggling with patience and want to learn to develop more of it, keep reading. This article will cover 11 reasons why practicing patience could improve your business and tips for developing your patience skills.
1. Helps You Make Better Decisions
Becoming more patient can help you to make better decisions because you aren’t rushing into them. Fully analyzing a situation and determining the potential risk/reward can help you avoid unwanted or unfortunate consequences that you could’ve otherwise avoided had you been more patient.
In addition, being patient allows you to determine whether a decision aligns with your long-term goals. By slowing down your decision-making, you can help yourself stay on the path toward your goals and better prepare yourself for the unexpected.
2. Helps You Focus On the Process
Being patient can help you focus on enjoying the process of being a business owner rather than only focusing on future success. Placing your focus on the present and understanding that results take time may remove some stress and pressure off your plate.
Placing your focus on the present and understanding that results take time may remove some stress and pressure off your plate.
3. Might Improve Your Resilience
Practicing patience can improve your resilience because you learn how to stay strong during challenging times. When you’re patient amid troubles, you allow yourself to stay on the course toward your long-term goals, which may improve stability over time.
4. Patience Could Increase Gratitude
Becoming more patient may increase your gratitude because you’re focusing on what’s right in front of you. By remaining patient in your journey, you can better focus on your progress and achievements thus far.
5. May Decrease Anxiety
Improving your patience skills may decrease your anxiety about uncertainty and the future of your business. According to this study analyzed by Robert Cerullo, “Another resilience factor that could reduce anxiety is patience. Patience is defined as “the propensity of a person to wait calmly in the face of frustration, adversity, or suffering” (Schnitker, 2012, p. 263). Schnitker (2012) has shown that patience and well-being are positively correlated.” As you can see, building your patience may help to reduce your anxiety, potentially leading to lower stress levels.
Building your patience may help to reduce your anxiety, potentially leading to lower stress levels. Click To Tweet
6. Patience Might Enhance Your Reputation
Patience and reputation usually go hand in hand. Being patient allows us to work toward our goals even if we don’t see any results. Over time, people may start to recognize our determined efforts, leading them to perceive us as hard-working and persevering individuals.
7. Can Improve Your Relationships
Patience is a key element in most relationships. Building patience may allow you to make smarter word choices and control your emotions. For example, an impatient person may say things they don’t mean in their relationship, leading to increased tension. On the other hand, a patient person might carefully choose their words to avoid hurting the other person. In addition, a patient person may be better able to control their emotions, which could prevent them from making irrational decisions.
Another example would be your relationships with your employees. The more patient you are, the easier it may become to communicate with your employees without flying off the handle or making rash decisions, such as firing someone.
Building patience may allow you to make smarter word choices and control your emotions.
8. Patience May Lead to Greater Rewards
Typically, those who practice patience avoid instant gratification because they believe their efforts will produce something much better. Unlike most people, patient people usually delay gratification and work hard toward their goals. As a result, those who are patient may benefit from their discipline because they refuse to give up. As a business owner, avoiding instant gratification may help you to stay focused on your goals, leading to potentially great rewards.
9. Could Improve Other Habits
Practicing patience may benefit other habits because it forces you to stay focused on your long-term goals. For example, you might start the habit of exercising a few times a week. An impatient person might quit after a few weeks because they didn’t get the results they wanted. On the other hand, a patient person might continue to move forward because they are determined to reach their goals.
10. Patience Might Improve Self-Control
A patient person knows how to control their thoughts and emotions. They don’t allow themselves to get caught up in their emotions and make rash decisions. Instead, they take a step back and choose how they can respond to certain circumstances. As a business owner, maintaining self-control may help you to make smarter decisions and prevent unnecessary setbacks.
Maintaining self-control may help you to make smarter decisions and prevent unnecessary setbacks. Click To Tweet
11. Can Increase Tolerance
Becoming more patient may increase your tolerance when things do not go as planned. As a business owner, many things in your business may not go according to your plan. However, developing patience may help you go with the flow and stay resilient when life throws you curveballs.
Tips for Developing More Patience
Start Small
Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither is patience. To work towards becoming more patient, you could practice with minor inconveniences you experience throughout the week. For example, you could practice being patient while waiting in traffic or in line at a coffee shop. Although these events may seem minor, the more you practice patience in the small things, the more it builds up. Eventually, by staying patient in the small things, being patient in the big things may become easier.
By staying patient in the small things, being patient in the big things may become easier.
Try to Establish Realistic Expectations
Before beginning your journey to becoming more patient, it might be beneficial to set realistic expectations. For example, it might be realistic to make a profit in your business within two years, not two months. Setting these expectations early can help you not to become discouraged when things don’t go as expected.
Develop an Action Plan
It can be tempting to go all in with anything related to your business. While this may seem like enthusiastic passion, failing to be patient may cause you to make poor decisions.
To help you become more patient, try to take a step back from your business and create an action plan mapping out every step or decision you may need to make. Creating an action plan can help you to make smarter decisions and set realistic expectations for your entrepreneurial journey.
Creating an action plan can help you to make smarter decisions and set realistic expectations for your entrepreneurial journey. Click To Tweet
