FINAL THOUGHTS ON PATIENCE There is one final reason why we tend toward speed over patience. Speed can be a defense mechanism. Ceaselessly moving fast and getting swept up in heroic individualism’s propensity to look outward helps us avoid confronting the things we fear most. But no amount of frenetic activity will make them go away. Try as we might, we cannot outrun these fears. They will always catch up. These include what for many is the fear underlying all others: our own mortality, a particularly hard concept to face. In ancient Buddhist texts, there is a parable about a strident deity
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