Patience is difficult to practice at work. Sometimes, other people’s ineptitude holds you back longer. Impatient people in these cases tense up, start sweating, get agitated, and are a hair’s length away from yelling at someone. Losing your patience at work will do you no service.
Colleagues view impatience as arrogant, insensitive, and impulsive. Employers view them as likely to make poor decisions, quick judgments or interrupt others. They are less likely to top lists for promotions.
If you want to manage your impatience and not let it ride out till you lose your temper and create irreparable damage, try the following tricks.
1. Take deep, slow breaths, and count to 10. This one is obvious. Doing it helps slow your heart rate, relaxes your body, and emotionally distances you from the situation. Do this several times.
2. Focus on relaxing your body. Impatience causes you to tense your muscles. Take slow, deep breaths; relax your muscles from your toes up to the top of your head.
3. Remember that you have a choice in how you react. You can choose to be patient, or not: it’s all up to you.
4. Slow down. Speak and move more slowly. By acting patient, you will soon feel patient.
5. Practice active listening and empathic listening. Make sure you give other people your full attention, and patiently plan your response.
6. Remind yourself that your impatience does not get others to move faster. Adversely, it can interfere with other people’s ability to perform complex or highly-skilled work.