Patience Quotes

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Patience is the ability to remain calm when dealing with a difficult or trying task, situation, or person.

Patience is a prominent theme in religion, and many of us have grown up being told that “patience is a virtue.” In short, it is the level of endurance you have before getting frustrated.

Being a steadfast and patient person isn’t always easy, especially in the face of the pressure and challenges put upon us in modern society.

Yet being able to persevere, tolerate delay, and respond to stressful situations without annoyance or anger are all incredibly valuable and noble personality traits.

We hope these patience quotes give you with the steadiness and wisdom you need to endure every situation you encounter with patience and positivity.

Patience Quotes

Helen Keller patience quote "We could never learn to be brave and patient, if there were only joy in the world"
“We could never learn to be brave and patient, if there were only joy in the world.” – Helen Keller

One moment of patience may ward off great disaster. One moment of impatience may ruin a whole life.

Chinese Proverb

I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end.

Margaret Thatcher

When it comes to patience, we don’t have to change old habits; we can build better ones.

Sue Bender

To lose patience is to lose the battle.

Mahatma Gandhi

Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word happy would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness. It is far better take things as they come along with patience and equanimity.

Carl Jung
Michelangelo quote "Genius is eternal patience"
“Genius is eternal patience.” – Michelangelo

Patience is necessary, and one cannot reap immediately where one has sown.

Soren Kierkegaard

Come what may, all bad fortune is to be conquered by endurance.

Virgil

If I have done the public any service, it is due to my patient thought.

Isaac Newton

How many a man has thrown up his hands at a time when a little more effort, a little more patience would have achieved success.

Elbert Hubbard

He that can have patience can have what he will.

Benjamin Franklin

It is easier to find men who will volunteer to die, than to find those who are willing to endure pain with patience.

Julius Caesar
Ambrose Pierce quote "Patience, n. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue"
“Patience, n. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue.” – Ambrose Bierce

The two hardest tests on the spiritual road are the patience to wait for the right moment and the courage not to be disappointed with what we encounter.

Paulo Coelho

An alternative to love is not hate but patience.

Santosh Kalwar

Nature never rushes, yet everything gets done.

Lao Tzu

Don’t try to rush things: for the cup to run over, it must first be filled.

Antonio Machado

Have patience with all things but first with yourself. Never confuse your mistakes with your value as a human being. You are perfectly valuable, creative, worthwhile person simply because you exist. And no amount of triumphs or tribulations can ever change that.

St. Frances de Sales
"Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet"
“Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.” – Aristotle

Knowing trees, I came to realize, understand and appreciate the act of patience.

Ogwo David Emenike

So much in a revolution is nothing but waiting.

Sinclair Lewis

Learning patience can be a difficult experience, but once conquered, you will find life is easier.

Catherine Pulsifer

Patience is the best remedy for every trouble.

Plautus

Knowing trees, I understand the meaning of patience. Knowing grass, I can appreciate persistence.

Hal Borland
"Above all, trust in the slow work of God"
“Above all, trust in the slow work of God.” – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Think of the patience God has had for you and let it resonate to others. If you want a more patient world, let patience be your motto.

Steve Maraboli

Patience is not the ability to wait. Patience is to be calm no matter what happens, constantly take action to turn it to positive growth opportunities, and have faith to believe that it will all work out in the end while you are waiting.

Roy T. Bennett

It is very strange…that the years teach us patience; that the shorter our time, the greater our capacity for waiting.

Elizabeth Taylor, A Wreath of Roses

Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish.

John Quincy Adams

I have just three things to teach: simplicity, patience, compassion. These three are your greatest treasures.

Lao Tzu
"Patience attracts happiness; it brings near that which is far"
“Patience attracts happiness; it brings near that which is far.” – Swahili Proverb

One minute of patience, ten years of peace.

Greek Proverb

Be patient and understanding. Life is too short to be vengeful or malicious.

Philips Brooks

Patience is not the ability to wait, but the ability to keep a good attitude while waiting.

Unknown

With love and patience, nothing is impossible.

Daisaku Ikeda

Two things define you: your patience when you have nothing and your attitude when you have everything.

George Bernard Shaw
Edmund Burke patience quote "Our patience will achieve more than our force"
“Our patience will achieve more than our force.” – Edmund Burke

Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day.

A.A. Milne, Winnie The Pooh

Your least favorite virtue, or nominee for the most overrated one? Faith. Closely followed—in view of the overall shortage of time—by patience.

Christopher Hitchens

Inner peace is impossible without patience. Wisdom requires patience. Spiritual growth implies the mastery of patience. Patience allows the unfolding of destiny to proceed at its won unhurried pace.

Brian Weiss

Each life is made up of mistakes and learning, waiting and growing, practicing patience and being persistent.

Billy Graham

I think patience is a skill and I wish I had it.

David Duchovny
Erik Erikson quote "The more you know yourself, the more patience you have for what you see in others"
“The more you know yourself, the more patience you have for what you see in others.” – Erik Erikson

The practice of patience in crafting and process is a virtue that needs to come back.

Zac Posen

The first requirement of politics is not intellect or stamina but patience. Politics is a very long run game and the tortoise will usually beat the hare.

John Major

Patience is a conquering virtue.

Geoffrey Chaucer

Talent is a long patience, and originality an effort of will and intense observation.

Gustave Flaubert

For anything worth having one must pay the price; and the price is always work, patience, love, self-sacrifice – no paper currency, no promises to pay, but the gold of real service.

John Burroughs
Paolo Coelho quote "Why is patience so important? Because it makes us pay attention"
“Why is patience so important? Because it makes us pay attention.” – Paulo Coelho

To bear with patience wrongs done to oneself is a mark of perfection, but to bear with patience wrongs done to someone else is a mark of imperfection and even of actual sin.

Thomas Aquinas

I’m patient.

Michael Jordan

Endurance is the crowning quality, And patience all the passion of great hearts.

James Russell Lowell

One problem with age is that patience begins to ebb.

Carl Hiaasen

A perfect chutney needs patience. If you are cooking it, cook it on a low flame; the flavors come out the best that way.

Maneet Chauhan
Ovid patience quote "Bear patiently with a rival"
“Bear patiently with a rival.” – Ovid

Patience and tenacity are worth more than twice their weight of cleverness.

Thomas Huxley

I like playing. I wouldn’t be a good coach. I don’t have the patience to be a coach.

Tom Brady

Abused patience turns to fury.

Thomas Fuller

Slow and Steady wins the race

Aesop

And sure enough, even waiting will end…if you can just wait long enough.

William Faulkner

The strongest of all warriors are these two — Time and Patience.

Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace

The key to everything is patience. You get the chicken by hatching the egg, not by smashing it.

Arnold H. Glasgow
Vera Nazarin quote "Patience is not a virtue. It is an achievement"
“Patience is not a virtue. It is an achievement.” – Vera Nazarin

A waiting person is a patient person. The word patience means the willingness to stay where we are and live the situation out to the full in the belief that something hidden there will manifest itself to us.

Henri J.M. Nouwen

Patience means active waiting and enduring. It means staying with something and doing all that we can – working, hoping, and exercising faith; bearing hardship with fortitude, even when the desires of our hearts are delayed. patience is not simply enduring; it is enduring well!

Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Patience is the calm acceptance that things can happen in a different order than the one you have in mind.

David G. Allen

Patience is the ability to idle your motor when you feel like stripping your gears.

Barbara Johnson
Holbrook Jackson quote "Patience has its limits, take it too far and it's cowardice"
“Patience has its limits, take it too far and it’s cowardice.” – Holbrook Jackson

The world gives us PLENTY of opportunities to strengthen our patience. While this truth can definitely be challenging, this is a good thing. Patience is a key that unlocks the door to a more fulfilling life. It is through a cultivation of patience that we become better parents, powerful teachers, great businessmen, good friends, and a live a happier life.

Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free

There is no substitute for hard work, 23 or 24 hours a day. And there is no substitute for patience and acceptance.

Cesar Chavez

God always has patience.

Pope Francis

The keys to patience are acceptance and faith. Accept things as they are, and look realistically at the world around you. Have faith in yourself and in the direction you have chosen.

Ralph Marston

Hope is patience with the lamp lit.

Tertullian
"Everything comes if a man will only wait"
“Everything comes if a man will only wait.” – Benjamin Disraeli

Writing is good, thinking is better. Cleverness is good, patience is better.

Hermann Hesse

Patience is not passive waiting. Patience is active acceptance of the process required to attain your goals and dreams.

Ray A. Davis

If you are irritated by every rub, how will your mirror be polished?

Rumi

You’re trying to eat grass that isn’t there. Why don’t you give it a chance to grow?

Richard Adams, Watership Down

Some people can never understand that you have to wait, even for the best of things, until the right time comes.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Tolerance is nothing more than patience with boundaries.

Shannon Alder
"Trees that are slow to grow bear the best fruit"
“Trees that are slow to grow bear the best fruit.” – Moliere

Perfect love is perfectly patient.

Neal A. Maxwell

My dear son, be patient, because the weaknesses of the body are given to us in this world by God for the salvation of the soul. So they are of great merit when they are borne patiently.

St. Francis of Assisi

Patience is the art of concealing your impatience.

Guy Kawasaki

Hurry up and wait.

Unknown, U.S. Military Saying

Patience is the support of weakness; impatience the ruin of strength.

Charles Caleb Colton

A healthy male adult bore consumes each year one and a half times his own weight in other people’s patience.

John Updike
William Penn quote "Patience and Diligence, like faith, remove mountains"
“Patience and Diligence, like faith, remove mountains.” – William Penn

Work hard. And have patience. Because no matter who you are, you’re going to get hurt in your career and you have to be patient to get through the injuries.

Randy Johnson

Patience is the most necessary quality for business, many a man would rather you heard his story than grant his request.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

There are very little things in this life I cannot afford and patience is one of them.

Larry Hagman

I think I have more patience now than I did in the past.

T. Boone Pickens

Trying to understand is like straining through muddy water. Have the patience to wait! Be still and allow the mud to settle.

Lao Tzu
Luc de Clapiers quote "Patience is the art of hoping"
“Patience is the art of hoping.” – Luc de Clapiers

We hope you’ve enjoyed these patience quotes! If your favorite quote about the importance of enduring difficult situations with patience is missing, share it with us below and stay patient while you work towards your goals.

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Natalie Seale

Natalie Seale is a writer and researcher with an MA, MSc, and PhD in History from the University of Edinburgh. Natalie is an avid reader, a keen traveller, and enjoys cooking and walking with her English Spaniel. Her posts focus on inspiring ideas and tips that help people learn, gro, and inspire others.

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