Unpopular Virtues: Patience

Making Monday

One of the reasons makers are outnumbered by users is because makers depend on unpopular virtues like patience.

Many people think patience means, "putting up with stuff." That's true only in a superficial sense. The patience of the makers is intimately twined with the deep understanding required for true making.

I once heard a creation story in which each phase ended with the phrase, "... and the gods saw that they would be obeyed." I was struck by the thought that even the gods of creation had to be patient.

Impatience is one of the hallmarks of users. Their impatience stems from the fact that users believe they and their purposes are categorically more important than the thing being made.

For makers, patience is a fundamental virtue that can best be summarized as not cutting corners and not taking short cuts.

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