The Six Paramitas - Patience

Kyohei Mikawa

Minister, Rissho Kosei-kai Buddhist Center of Los Angeles

Today let us explore the third element of the Buddha's teaching of the Six Paramitas: patience. How is the word "patience" used in our lives? When you are undergoing emotional pain from a breakup, your friend may say to you, "You’ve got to be patient until the hardest time after the breakup passes." When you teach something you are skilled at to someone who is learning it for the first time, you may think, "It's this person's first time. Let me patiently watch how she does it without pressuring her." What does "patience" really mean?

According to the Longman English Dictionary, it means: "the ability to continue waiting or doing something for a long time without becoming angry or anxious" or "the ability to accept trouble and other people's annoying behavior without complaining or becoming angry." These clear definitions make me wonder: does "the ability not to be angry, anxious, or complaining" mean the ability not to invite these feelings into one's mind, like a Buddha—or does it simply mean suppressing these emotions?

In her book The End of Suffering, our recent guest speaker Ani Lodro introduces how patience is explained in the Buddhist sutra The Perfection of Wisdom in 8,000 Lines: "The perfection of patience is not to be disturbed by others' actions, even when harmed." (p.110)

She comments on this passage by saying: "Patience invites us to sit with discomfort rather than retaliate, to endure not as victims but as conscious beings. Reactivity, entitlement, and fragile pride are hallmarks of unprocessed wounds. Many people who lash out or shut down do so because the psyche has interpreted delay or frustration as humiliation or threat. Patience undoes this misperception. It expands our inner container." (p.110)

Ani's insight illuminates that patience means remaining in discomfort without seeking revenge, and thereby enduring as an aware self without becoming a victim. How elegant this is! Buddhism helps people grow into true masters in the field of spiritual and emotional development.

Remaining in discomfort is not easy at all—at least for me. But from my own experience, I know that staying with discomfort is an important part of Buddhist practice, rather than running away from it (= practice of the first of Four Noble Truths). At the same time, we cannot force this process. I believe it is completely okay to step away from discomfort until we eventually feel ready to face it.

She concludes: "In our daily lives, introducing the practice of patience encourages us to understand discomfort and uncertainty as feelings that do not need to unravel our emotional composure or lead us into a story that triggers anger and other negative emotions." (p.111)

Six Paramita Journal (2026).pdf

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Wondrously,

Kyohei