“To lose patience is to lose the battle.” – Mahatma Gandhi
Today we live in a taxing social order where anxiety and dissatisfaction control us, and we lose command over our thoughts and actions. We seem to be running in a race where we want to acquire everything at once. However, we, at DPS Kota, one of the top ten schools in Kota, firmly believe that no parent on earth would want their young ones to adopt a similar hassled attitude towards life. And for that, it is crucial that children are instilled with a key life trait called “patience.”
What exactly is patience, you may ask. So, as per Wikipedia, “Patience is the ability to endure difficult circumstances, or showing forbearance in the face of delay.” In simple words, it is basically a person’s ability to stand the challenges without losing their calm. And when it comes to our children, patience holds even more significance in their lives. Scholars have noted several benefits of being patient in life for kids, like:
- They learn to be more polite, cooperative, empathetic, and forgiving with friends when they practice patience. It was also found in a 2008 study by Oliver Scott Curry (University of Oxford). In the experiment, participants were asked to contribute money to a common pot, which would be redistributed later. It was observed that patient people contributed more to the pot than other players.
- Kids learn to utilize the time before acting too quickly while evaluating the options at hand.
- They learn tolerance, which is essential for their coming years.
- Stability comes in life’s other emotions like joy, calmness, peace, etc., while practicing patience in day-to-day chores.
- As per a 2007 study by Fuller Theological Seminary professor Sarah A. Schnitker and Psychology professor Robert Emmons, patient persons enjoy good physical as well as mental health. They are less prone to experiencing depression and negative emotions. Also, they are less likely to report health problems like headaches, ulcers, diarrhea, pneumonia, and troubled sleep.
So now, when we have seen the various benefits of imbuing patience in children, we, at DPS Kota, would like to share with our respected parent fraternity a few ways that you can try and adopt to encourage your kids to practice and embrace the skill of patience. Read on.
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Portray patience in your own approach
Your kids see themselves when they see you. You act as a mirror for them because they look up to you all the time. Hence, make sure you put your patience into practice and present a patient version of yourself in front of them.
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Encourage and appreciate
When kids show patience, make sure to acknowledge it so that they feel encouraged enough to do it again.
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Finger on lips strategy
Silence is an imperative part of patience. You can take the help of a stopwatch and ask your little ones to maintain pin-drop silence for as long as possible and finally reward the person who sits still for the longest time.
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Attitude is all that matters
Teaching patience is a slow and time taking task. Hence, being grumpy or complaining will trigger in the opposite direction and further complicate things. Instead, try and stay calm, composed, positive, and smiling.
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Go back to the non-digital era
Putting smart gadgets at bay and instead indulging in activities that take more time, e.g., origami, board games, growing a plant, baking, fishing, coloring, solving big puzzles, will teach the kids to be more patient. All of these are such activities that take time to show their results, and this way, in the process, they learn to be patient.
At DPS Kota, one of the top ten schools in Kota, we firmly believe that patience is one of the fundamental virtues of life that must be inevitably taught to kids. It is a skill that not only comes to their aid in the short run and helps them gain control on their impulses but has many long-run benefits as well. We have seen that children who know how to hold their patience are comparatively better at problem-solving and remain stress-free. Thus, we would urge the parents to try and instill this crucial trait in your kids, and we hope the pointers mentioned in this article above will come to your aid in this regard.