Do you hate queuing or waiting on hold? The chances are, you’ll be able to relate to this post! Read on to discover 10 things you’ll only understand if you’re an impatient person.
Patience is a virtue, so the old proverb says. Our ability to wait calmly for something to happen without becoming frustrated is often seen as a measure of character. How many times were you told to be patient when you’d nag your parents for something as a child, or perhaps even later on in life when it comes to building your career and saving up to buy your first home?
While the importance of being patient is often drilled into us from a young age, however, it comes easier to some of us than others. 84% of UK adults would describe themselves as impatient, with over 40% agreeing there is nothing more frustrating than wasted time, according to a recent study by promotional products retailer, 4imprint.
This ‘Need It Now’ culture is driving companies to innovate in terms of how they do business with modern consumers, with 82% of office workers claiming that they’re now expected to deliver instant results at work. With ‘now’ becoming the new norm, many brands are catering to our need for speed. Take 4imprint’s 24-hour range of promotional merchandise, for example.
So, how do you know if you’re an impatient person? Here are a few examples of situations that can cause even the most placid of people to lose their patience. How many can you relate to?
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5 situations that are guaranteed to test your patience
People walking slowly in front of you in the supermarket
When I’m doing my weekly food shop, the last thing I need is to have people doing the trolley shuffle in front of me. You know what I mean. I can’t stand how some people lean across the handlebar of their trollies as they slowly shuffle their feet along, slowly edging the trolley forward a few centimetres every time.
Equally, I can’t stand it when people walk really slowly in front of you, making sure they have time to look at every single thing they walk past, heaven forbid they might miss out on something. Oh, and don’t even get me started on people who bump into friends and have full-blown conversations while blocking the aisles.
Waiting forever to get seated or served in a restaurant
I love going out to eat. There’s nothing I love more than spending my hard-earned cash on treating myself to a slap-up meal cooked by someone else, without any need for me to do the dishes afterwards.
That said, regardless of how often I eat out, I still expect a particular level of service when I walk into a restaurant to spend my money. Starting with the experience you receive when you walk through the door. There’s nothing worse than having to wait for over five minutes just to be seated or handed the menu (assuming you haven’t been pre-warned about the wait), let alone beginning to think you’ve been forgotten about when you’ve been sat there for half an hour without placing your order, or waiting forever for your food to come out from the kitchen.
Waiting on hold
In today’s digital age, I rarely ever need to make a phone call unless it’s to my friends and family. Why bother speaking to a real human being when you can get most things done online, right?
Well, actually, it’s not the hassle that comes with communicating with someone in a call centre somewhere across the other side of the world that deters me from picking up the phone in these kinds of situations; it’s the fear that I might end up waiting on hold. There aren’t many things that can suck the life and energy out of your day in the way that waiting on hold to speak to your bank, your GP, your utilities provider or whoever it may be, can. For some reason, they always seem to choose the most irritating hold music too!
Queuing – just about anywhere
This is an obvious one. I don’t think I know anyone who enjoys queuing. Whether it be in the GP or dental surgery, at a shop or at a nightclub or live concert, there’s nothing fun about having to stand and wait in line.
My worst case queuing scenarios include checking in and passing through security in airports, queuing up to exchange or refund an item in just about any store and queueing to get a drink from a busy bar. When I visited India in 2016, there were serious cash shortages and I had to queue for around an hour to withdraw cash from any ATMs which happened to have any left in them – now that was a nightmare!
Waiting for your luggage after a long-haul flight
Whenever I catch a long-haul flight, by the time I arrive back on the tarmac in the UK, I’m itching to unfasten my seatbelt, get my bag out of the overhead cabin, stuff all my belongings into it and get off the plane. As I live in Cardiff, I usually have a three to four-hour coach journey ahead of me before I get home, so I don’t like to waste any time.
By the time I arrive in the baggage hall, I’m expecting to see my suitcase go chugging around the carousel at any moment. The last thing I want to see are those fatal words, ‘awaiting baggage’ stretched across the display screen hanging above me!
Do you class yourself as a patient person or do you have a tendency to lose your rag in certain situations? Comment below and let me know which kind of situations wind you up the most.
Here are some posts you might like to read before you head off:
- How to Have Fun Travelling With Your Parents
- 3 Reasons to Shop at Raymond James Caravans
- 17 Holiday Hair Care Tips