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patience

The Art of Allowing

January 10, 2023 5 Comments

A few years ago, I got some specific feedback that it would serve me, my work, and my growth to start practicing the art of allowing in a more conscious and deliberate way. 

While I was familiar with the concept of allowing, I realized I had little awareness or experience of it in actual practice.

As I looked more deeply at it, I realized that I had a judgment about the whole concept of “allowing.” It had always seemed weak, passive, lazy, or based on “luck” to me. I’ve always prided myself on being a hard worker and someone who makes things happen. 

However, as I’ve come to realize, much of my intense work ethic has to do with a deep-seated fear that if I ever slow down, stop pushing so hard, or simply expect things to just show up with ease, the whole house of cards of my life and my work might simply come crashing down around me. 

Can you relate?

The Power of Acceptance

The art of allowing is an essential aspect of life and growth. It’s also a critical aspect of our success and fulfillment. The first aspect of allowing has to do with us accepting things as they are. One of my favorite quotes on this is from author and teacher Byron Katie who says, “When you argue with reality, you lose – but only 100% of the time.”

When we’re able to allow people, things, and situations to be as they are without judging them, trying to fix them, or wanting them to be some other way than how they actually are, we begin to tap into the immense power of allowing. Ironically and somewhat paradoxically, when we truly allow things and people to be exactly as they are, we open up a space for real change and transformation to occur (if that is what we want).

Trust, Patience, and Faith

The deeper aspect of allowing has to do with trusting, being patient, and having faith that what we want to manifest, create, and experience can and will show up as it is meant to. 

In other words, it’s an ability to allow things to happen and materialize without us having to manipulate, dominate, or control to make things happen. For those of us, myself included, who tend to be a bit controlling at times, this can be incredibly challenging.

The paradox that exists with allowing runs deep within us. So many of us were taught and believe the saying that “if it is to be, it’s up to me.” And while there is truth and wisdom in this philosophy, as many of us know, feeling as though we have to work hard, run fast, keep up, and make everything happen is exhausting and insatiable. 

No matter how hard we work, what we try to fix, or all of the changes we intend to make, if we don’t learn, practice, and ultimately master the art of allowing – true success and fulfillment will always elude us. Never underestimate the power of patience. Action is important, but we have to also learn to balance it out with our ability to allow.

Allowing takes faith, patience, and trust – three things essential for our peace of mind and well-being in life.  However, these are not things we focus on, learn about, or are encouraged to practice in our intense, fast-paced, results-oriented culture. 

The art of allowing is truly an art and often runs contrary to societal norms and pressures. It has to do with remembering, as the well-known saying goes, “We’re human beings, not human doings.” 

How to Enhance Your Ability to Allow in Your Life

Here are a few things to think about and practice as you enhance your capacity and ability to allow with more ease in your life.

1. Ask yourself how you relate to the concept of “allowing.” 

Take some inventory of your relationship with this idea. How do you feel about it? How comfortable are you allowing things and people to be as they are and allowing things to manifest with ease in your life? For many of us, this is something we may understand but not practice. Tell the truth to yourself about how you relate to allowing and notice how this impacts your life – one way or another.

2. Pay attention to what you focus on in regards to your biggest goals and aspirations. 

Think about your biggest goals, dreams, and aspirations in your life right now. How much of your attention and energy is focused on doing, and how much is focused on allowing? While both doing and allowing are important, most of us put a disproportionate amount of attention on action. 

Increasing our focus on allowing and ultimately receiving can be a magical, relaxing, and incredibly effective way to relate to our goals and dreams. This is often one of the big missing pieces in our desire for success and, more importantly, fulfillment.

3. Create an allowing practice

This is a simple practice you can do daily (like prayer, meditation, quiet reflection, affirmation, etc.) where you put your attention and awareness on allowing – accepting things as they are, trusting that things are working out as they are meant to, believing that the feelings, experiences, accomplishments, and outcomes which you most desire are on their way, and allowing yourself to receive these gifts and blessings with ease and gratitude. 

You may need to reach out to others for support, guidance, and feedback about creating or deepening an allowing practice that will work for you – but doing this is one of the greatest gifts you can give to yourself (as well as to those around you).

Remember – We’re All in This Together

Have fun with this, and have compassion for yourself as well. For most of us, the art of allowing is a lot easier to think about or talk about than it actually is to practice and embody. The more attention we put on it, however, the easier it gets. And, as we deepen our ability and capacity to allow – our whole life can transform with ease, grace, and gratitude.

How are you at allowing? What can you do to allow things to be as they are and also allow things to show up with ease in your life? Share your thoughts, action ideas, insights, and more on my blog below.

Mike Robbins is the author of five books, including his latest, We’re All in This Together: Creating a Team Culture of High Performance, Trust, and Belonging. He’s a thought leader and sought-after speaker whose clients include Google, Wells Fargo, Microsoft, Schwab, eBay, Genentech, the Oakland A’s, and many others.   

Liked this article? Here are three more!

The Importance of Celebrating

Why Taking Breaks Is So Important

The Importance of Embracing Emotions (Including Anger)

This article was originally published in March 2010 and updated for 2023.

 

Filed Under: Blog, Uncategorized Tagged With: Appreciation, authenticity, gratitude, honesty, Katie Byron, letting go, Mike Robbins, Motivational Speaker, patience, self-help, Trust

The Power of Patience

July 11, 2022 Leave a Comment

Patience is powerful. It can help us persevere, reduce stress, and overcome challenges.

Patience may be a virtue, but it’s something I often find challenging. How about you?

Given the pace, uncertainty, and intensity of life and work these days, I don’t think I’m alone in the struggle to be patient.  

But why can it be so difficult to be patient? How can we be more patient with ourselves and those around us…at work and in life?

We live in an intense, fast-paced world. Everything is about speed, scale, and execution.

Slowing down has never been a strength for me in my life. I’ve always found it difficult to let things be and trust the process. 

However, this is actually what patience is all about – allowing things to be as they are and trusting that things will unfold as they are meant to.

It’s hard to do this in the best of circumstances, but over the last few years, it’s been even more challenging. One thing that can make patience specifically tricky is the fear that things won’t work out. 

While taking deliberate action and being proactive are essential, finding balance is also important. 

In my life, I’m often on the side of action and focus, which can, unfortunately, turn into control. 

As the saying goes, “Slow and steady wins the race.”  But, many of us collectively struggle to be patient and trust the process. Being patient is challenging for many of us – but there are real benefits to it regarding our wellbeing and success.

How to Embrace the Power of Patience

Here are some things we can do to be more patient…

1. Trust

Trust the process, trust yourself, and trust life. 

The psychological concept of basic trust is the belief that the world is safe – that we can trust life and the people around us. 

Having basic trust can be challenging depending on your life experiences and the things you’ve been through, as well as who you are, where you come from, and what you look like. 

But being able to trust life, the process, and the people around you, can help you overcome challenges and the need to be vigilant.  

2. Slow Down

Why are we moving so fast? 

Slowing down is more of a mindset, energy, and perspective. Sometimes patience is a process of allowing things to happen at their own pace and to be as they are.

The opposite of patience is forcing, speeding, and rushing through things. If we can slow down, we can create more space that allows us to be more patient.

3. Allow Things to Unfold

There is real power in pausing, even if for an extra second or two. Take a pause. Let things breathe. Allow things to flow. Trust that things are manifesting and unfolding as they’re meant to…give them enough space to do so.

4. Let Go of Control

Life is like rowing a boat. Many of us are rowing our boats upstream and wondering why we’re not moving. Sometimes instead of fighting to row harder against the current, we can simply just let go of the oars. 

This is all about allowing things to happen and going with the flow. What if we just let the current of the water take us? 

Doing this requires trust, slowing down, being patient, and trusting the process. Sometimes in life, we try to control things instead of letting them be. We have the ability to go with the flow and trust that we will eventually get where we need to go.

5. Remember That Whatever You’re Going Through Will Pass

Things have a way of working themselves out. 

We all go through struggles. Bad, painful, and challenging things happen to everyone in the world. But each of us have made it through 100% of the challenges we’ve ever faced up to this point in life.  If we’re still here, nothing has taken us out completely up to this point – even things we thought would. 

Try this exercise: when you’re going through something challenging, it can be helpful to list some of the most difficult things you’ve been through in your life. This can help remind us that we’ve been through a lot, overcome a lot, and learned a lot. You may have thought that you weren’t going to get through some of the things on the list – but you did. And usually, those are the most important lessons in our lives. 

Remember: this too shall pass. 

When facing a difficult challenge, ask yourself the following questions: 

What good is here that I can’t see? 

How might I be able to benefit from this? 

Why is this happening for me? 

These mindsets and approaches can help us be more patient when things aren’t going the way we want them to and they allow us to tap into the power of patience more broadly.

 

Where can you practice the power of patience in your life right now? Where do you see yourself being impatient? How can you bring more patience into your life?  Feel free to leave your thoughts and ideas in the comments below.

Mike Robbins is the author of five books, including his latest, We’re All in This Together: Creating a Team Culture of High Performance, Trust, and Belonging. He’s a thought leader and sought-after speaker whose clients include Google, Wells Fargo, Microsoft, Schwab, eBay, Genentech, the Oakland A’s, and many others.

Liked this article? Here are three more!

  • Do You Have Healthy Boundaries?
  • The Important Difference Between Self-Righteousness and Conviction
  • Keep Your Head in the Clouds and Your Feet on the Ground

 

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: acceptance, letting go, Mike Robbins, Motivational Speaker, patience

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