Introduction
Impatience can have two contrasting meanings depending on the desired results. On the one hand, it could be the eagerness for change. On the contrary, it could mean intolerance of anything that prevents the desired outcome. In both cases, one would still earn the title of being impatient.
The Target Behavior
Some behaviors as much as they may seem irresponsible, they have some positive results. Impatience is one of them. One may be impatient for various reasons. Some laws may be a hindrance to one’s goals. Therefore in fighting to achieve them, one becomes intolerant because of the time it is taking to get results. Self-modification is the process of modifying or improving one’s behavior through a systematic program (Lambert, 2004).
Due to impatience one was able to eat junk food. Since one had promised to watch over one’s diet, it ruined the goal for healthy living. Many are occasions one has hurried the school and class sessions and left the class with other commitments. When exams come, one’s students fail because of rushing over the syllabus. There have been situations where one has not been happy because of taking many hours on queues.
On one occasion, one almost shot and killed a shopper who had taken longer hours at the counter. One day while traveling in a taxi, one was dropped off halfway before completing the journey because of trying to force the driver to exceed the speed limit. On another occasion, one slapped a police officer for stopping the car at a police check up point.
The graph below shows the number of times the target behavior occurred on a daily basis;
According to the chart above, the tendency seems to have had a sharp increase towards the seventh day. It is because those are the days when one meets many people and has more work to do. The lesser the program of activities one has the lower the tendency of the target behavior.
One gets disorganized most of the times and may do things that are bad. Some people can trigger the anxiety especially when one sees the resolution to a matter being delayed for some time. One may get angry and feel helpless to do anything
Sometimes it gets so disastrous that someone can die. Due to such behavior one may forget the most important documents to use in an important meeting at work. As a result, this leads to cancelation or suspension of the meeting and punitive action after that.
Self Modification
Self-modification is a self-analysis of oneself and the desire to change one’s habit so that it becomes acceptable. One can show that there is a desire to change behavior if it publicly brings shame, if it is against the laws or if one feels that it does not auger well with one. Modifying one’s behavior helps one to avoid future mistakes.
Impatience can cause disagreements among people. It might lead to others believing that one is arrogant and demeaning. People can misjudge one believing that one does not have respect for time and others.
Since impatience has its sound effects, one can employ some of the positive reinforcements like continuing to fight for the rights of women. Since women have sometimes had problems with severe rules in some societies, fighting for their rights can help bring awareness to the people.
For a company that is in a busy place, it would require very hard working employees to achieve its goals. People who try their best to meet the business objectives must get a chance to propel the company to another level.
To do away with an impatient behavior, one can employ the negative reinforcement. It is the learning of a particular behavior in order to make an unlikeable behavior such as impatience to go away (Wierenga, 2002).
One can decide to go for therapy classes to get assistance in the recovery sessions. One can also start giving oneself a considerable amount of time to finish a particular activity. Reading novels can also help one to start taking time since it will make one to understand the value of taking time to learn things around.
One can also arrange to have activities follow each other in a timely manner. Learn to accept that tomorrow is another day and that some activities that are not urgent can wait. Having a priority list helps one to identify what comes first and what comes next (Raatma, 2000).
In the process, one can slowly do away with this target behavior. It may take an entire month of practice to achieve considerable results. However, one cannot do away with such a habit and not have something else to replace the bad behavior.
One can replace it with the opposite behavior. That action would make one to be patient. Patience would make one to wait for others and do things in a more organized manner.
To practice patience, one might have to read more books about the positive results of being patient. If one has an organized plan, then one must ensure that it gives one an ample time to complete each project at a time. As patience takes over, impatience fades away slowly until everything becomes as one desire.
Psychology helps people to address the immediate problems in life. As one studies and makes analysis, it enables one to make wise psychological decisions. Many people have target behaviors to change but have problems on how to start.
Conclusion
The results above got positive results because of doing away with the undesired behavior by operant conditioning. Putting in positive reinforcements of the positive behavior enabled one to achieve the desired goal.
By reading more and practicing time management enabled the bad behavior to go away and hence achievement of one’s goals. It is encouraging to know that one can self-modify without having to involve a therapist.
One can still employ escape learning. Through this system, one may learn to do a particular activity because it achieves the goal of preventing a dangerous event. For instance, by learning to be patient helps to prevent the negative results of impatience.
In order for one to self-modify, one must have the desire to change. A self-help mechanism is the best strategy. Even if one gets a therapist, the steps towards that change remain the same.
Another important thing to note is that if one takes the initiative, it motivates one to complete the process. It may not be easy to do way with old and bad habits. But it becomes worthwhile if the expected results bring positive change.
References
Lambert, M. (2004). Bergin and Garfield’s handbook of psychotherapy and behavior change. New York, NY: Wiley.
Raatma, L. (2000). Patience. Mankato, Minn.: Bridgestone Books.
Wierenga, M. (2002). Lifestyle modification. Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders Co.