Patience…please wait
8 of 10 in the series ‘Children Home Rules - They’re Not Just for Kids’
Here at W. Kim Tae Kwon Do, we have a set of rules that we give every child that joins our program. This list is called Children Home Rules. Basically, it’s a set of rules that aren’t any different from the rules that parents already have at home. They aren’t new, but they serve as a handy tool for reinforcement.
Children Home Rule #8 -
Children must not interrupt adult conversation.
Excuse me.
These two words make up one of the phrases that are ingrained into our society, but do they mean the same thing they used to?
As kids our world is very small. We are really only worried about the here and now and how it will affect us in the immediate short term. As a result, it’s important that we learn manners.Through our elementary, middle, and high school years, we conduct ourselves in an expected way that is respectful and mannerly (for the most part).
As adults, we teach our kids to wait patiently while mom and dad are talking to each other or other adults and if they want to ask or say something, they need to say ‘excuse me’. It doesn’t always result in immediate attention, but usually the adult will acknowledge and the child is mollified for the moment, confident that they will be heard soon.
Ultimately we are trying to teach patience and manners.
Unfortunately, many of these lessons seem to be forgotten as we get older and as a society keeps changing around us.
Technology keeps evolving and instant gratification has become a demand that companies are rushing to supply. As a result, patience seems to be in shorter supply these days. I can’t even count the amount of times in a week where I might be having a conversation with someone (an adult) and another adult comes over and butts into the conversation.
One of my friends who I grew up with, we’ll call him ‘Dean’. I’ve known Dean since 1st grade. He used to live in the Chicago area. He had a number of jobs in the suburban area and was used to the pace of life around here. Then through a series of life events he ended up moving to northern Wisconsin to a town that was quite literally 1000% less in population than what he grew up with. Dean took his ‘big city’ work ethic and applied it to what he knew in this new environment. His co-workers believed him to be domineering, aggressive, and intimidating due to the pace he expected things to get done. Fortunately for him, he’s always been good at adapting and quickly learned that the pace that he was used to moving at was not going to work there.
Now, Dean isn’t a rude person by nature but the faster paced life that he was used to led others to believe that he was short on patience.
What does Dean’s story have to do with Children Home Rule #8? Well, it comes back to patience. No amount of times saying excuse me to get what you want is going to make it come any faster.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m one of the few people I know that actually enjoys going in the city and experiencing the city life. I also enjoy going out into the country and enjoying the country life. The pace of both are quite different and I’m not saying one is better than the other. However, I don’t think it’s out of place for each way of life to have the time to say ‘excuse me’ and wait patiently for a result.
photo credit - Pixabay
