Right Now And Long Term
I think being aggressively patient is teachable as long as the person has a basic understanding of delayed gratification and long-term thinking.
Trying to derive the meaning of "aggressively patient" from these two words will interpret into something like someone who's so forcefully or intensely patience.
In reality or in this context, the actual meaning is someone who's impatient with their actions but patient with the results of their actions.
To put it in more context, let's take an example of a farmer planting an orchard of fruit trees.
Experienced farmers know it will take years before the trees bear fruit, but this doesn't justify for them to remain passive much along the process. Instead, they work tirelessly every day or two – preparing the soil, planting the saplings, setting up irrigation systems, pruning, protecting the young trees from pests etc.
Aggressive and relentless with daily actions, while still maintaining the patience to wait 5-7 years for the trees to mature and produce a full harvest.
In a way, one could see it as taking two very opposite endpoints and combining them together into a single powerful mindset that drives sustainable success.
Sustainability Square
In my view, such a paradoxical combination - being intensely active in the present while maintaining calm patience about future outcomes - is what separates sustainable achievement from both hasty shortcuts and passive waiting.
Not that I'm not a fan of passive waiting (there can be some wisdom in that), but there's a certain complacency that comes with mistaking patience for inaction, often leading to regret when opportunities slip away permanently.
Hasty shortcuts on the other hand, are just that, shortcuts. You never really arrive at any destination (e.g wealth) as a resident. More like a tourist that visits for some time and then gets expelled back to where they started, always worse off than before.
I think what trumps this seemingly paradoxical combination is it resolves the apparent conflict between urgency and patience.
In a strictly linear way of thinking, you can't have a keen sense of urgency and be patient at the same time. It's similar to when they say "you can't be wise and in love at the same time." The point I'm trying to make is that these apparent contradictions only exist when we view them through a narrow, either-or lens.
In that sense, rather than choosing between "hurry up and get results" or "just be patient and wait," it channels the energy of urgency into the actions while applying patience to the expectations.
Managing expectations isn't just about lowering them or extending timelines. But having a sustainable rhythm of consistent progress without the burnout of demanding immediate results or the stagnation of passive waiting will do the job of naturally aligning our expectations with reality.
On a macro level, as a global citizen, this might be a great way to combine the essence of both Western and Eastern cultures. The best of both worlds.
Thanks for reading!! Share your thoughts below on the comments.
Great way to finish this! It is true, maybe if we combined the best of both worlds, we would arrive to something better. The Western culture is often more in a hurry than the Eastern culture. Of course, this is a generalization, and at a granular level we may find all sort of combinations in both cultures.
Yes, I think the West generally tends to overdo it, over work, over party etc. But if we could counteract it with some Eastern values or principles of learning to incorporate patience in the things we do, then we'll be at a much better situation, that's beneficial to many aspects of our life.
In my own case, what I notice interestingly is one can't do without the other, especially in this modern age. I need both to stay level headed and achieve clarity.
Thanks for stopping by :)
Well, Eastern cultures don't shy away from hard work either. I'd say they work more and are more disciplined than in the West, plus they are paid less, which is why many companies moved production to China, for example. But with the rise of AIs and robots, this may be a leverage they may not have anymore, when many jobs will be automatized.
I agree and personally I do fall in the same category that appreciates and needs both to make good decisions and pursue plans on the medium and long term.
Right. They also work hard and tend to be more driven than the West in this regard. I think maybe their new advantage could come from being early in crypto and web3 in general, the adoption rate is higher around that part of the world than the West, on average.
I wouldn't say they adopted crypto the most. The US is not far behind on the 4th position, Nigeria is the 2nd in Africa, some countries in Latin America are doing well too. But overall, they do have a good penetration of crypto in Asia, and a high population, so that is to their advantage.
Oh yes, the high population definitely does helps. Sometimes, watching crypto conferences in Asia gives me the impression that Asia is a main hub for crypto adoption. But I could well be in a bubble lol, since I tend to consume less western and more eastern content recently.
I think also the openness to participating in it, could also be an overall advantage.
The openness is something I also appreciate in the societies where it exists for crypto (and not only). For some reason, Europe seems to keep falling behind. Maybe that "old" from "old continent" has something to do with it. Although, historically, Africa is the oldest... But they adopt crypto rather quickly. For them, it's important especially since many are unbanked, so crypto is a way to facilitate payments. Europe doesn't have that incentive.
Right. Compared to Africa, Europe already has relatively established financial systems that although archaic(compared to modern times) are still functional and used by the population. Still to this day, PayPal isn't supported in many African countries as a way to send payments internationally. There are fintech apps that are coming up as possible alternatives but I'll rather jump straight into crypto and dip my toes into it than try out those new alternative apps.
Yes, I read they are using various apps for payments instead of banks, at least in some African countries. But they are also more likely to adopt crypto, since these apps themselves are an alternative method of transacting, so from there to crypto is a smaller step than from the rigidity of a banking system.