Patience is the great multiplier. Obviously, had I simply been patient, I would have eventually reached my goals (or at least the ceiling of my genetic ability). In fact, I would have been better off working slower and steadier, because patience can partially replace intensity — the amount of daily exertion required for progress is usually well beneath your peak-output capacity. On the flipside, intensity is a poor substitute for patience — you can only do so much in a single day, and the quality of work you do after 20 straight hours is usually much less than what you produce in the first hour. For non-trivial endeavors in particular, an attempt to replace patience with intensity will inevitably result in burnout and failure.
Intensity can be a vice. If you’re good at working hard, you’ll be tempted to try and trade patience for intensity. This might work in high school, but at some point, if you continue tackling progressively greater challenges, you'll hit a brick wall. I became painfully aware of this during my sophomore year of college, when my programming assignments suddenly couldn’t be completed the day they were due in a single marathon session.
If you’re looking for a showcase of impatience and burnout, look no further than your local gym. Few people have the patience needed to stay in shape their whole life. Of those with the potential, many work too hard in an attempt to get faster results, ultimately giving up in exhaustion, frustration, and/or injury.
People who fail a fitness program usually don’t plan to quit forever. Rather, they plan to start again at some point in the future. But if you quit now, you throw away whatever progress you made. It would be far better to lower your goals (If you really wanted to be an Olympic athlete, you wouldn’t be thinking about quitting, so why not strive to simply be fit?), adjust your program, and then trudge along. But this stings the pride, and trudging really isn’t all that attractive.
In contrast, a clean slate is very tempting. You get to wipe away your mistakes, ignore the fact that your goals might be too lofty — and this time, you’re really going to kick ass. I’ve been there, done that. It’s much more appealing than injecting modesty and patience into your current routine, but the problem is that it does not work. Throwing away bad drawings doesn’t make you a better artist, just as quitting a fitness regimen won’t make you a better athlete.
The enticement of a fresh start is nearly always a Sirens’ Song, distracting you from the real problem: impatience. Although patience by itself won’t get you anywhere, it’s usually the limiting factor; and wiping away your mistakes, all the while vowing to work harder “next time,” will not compensate for a lack of patience. Starting over is rarely anything more than the stuff of failed New Years resolutions.
Is there a time and place for starting over? Probably. But personally, the next time I feel the urge to start from scratch, I’m going to ask myself if it’s really the best choice, or if it’s simply more appealing than confronting my impatience.
