For parents · Building steady kids
How to help your child learn patience
Short answer: Patience grows slowly, much like the things children wait for. Make the wait something your child can see or count, give their hands a job while it passes, and notice out loud when they manage it. Most children learn to wait by practising it with you, a little longer each time.
“Is it time yet?” Every parent knows the question, asked for the fourth time in five minutes. Young children live in the present, and to a four-year-old “after dinner” can feel as far away as next year. When they ask again and again, they aren’t being naughty. They haven’t yet learned how long a wait really is, or what to do while it passes.
What to say in the moment
- Make the wait visible: “When the sand runs out, it’s your turn.” “Two more sleeps.” A wait your child can see or count feels shorter than one that’s only “soon”.
- Give the wait a job: “While the cake bakes, can you set out the plates?” Busy hands make the minutes go faster, and waiting with nothing to do is the hardest kind of waiting.
- Notice it when they manage: “You waited the whole time the kettle boiled. That was patient.” When you name it out loud, your child starts to see patience as something they have.
The idea underneath
A man once asked Epictetus how he could stay steady and good-tempered while a family quarrel dragged on. Epictetus told him not to expect it overnight, and reached for a fig tree to explain why.
From the Stoics
Nothing great, said Epictetus, is produced suddenly, since not even the grape or the fig is. If you say to me now that you want a fig, I will answer to you that it requires time: let it flower first, then put forth fruit, and then ripen.
Children understand fruit. A seed on the windowsill won’t sprout any faster for being stared at, and a peach picked green is hard and sour. Patience grows the same way, which is worth remembering on the days your child seems to have none of it. A four-year-old who can’t wait is still flowering, and each small wait you help them through brings the fruit a bit closer to ripe. That’s the heart of The Passing Bowl, a Stoic Sprout story about waiting your turn and trusting that your share will reach you.
What to avoid
- Filling every wait with a screen. Sometimes a screen is what gets everyone through the doctor’s waiting room, and that’s fine. But a child who always has a screen to fill the gap never gets to practise waiting without one, and a bit of boredom is where that practice happens.
- Asking for more than their age can give. A toddler can manage a minute or two. A school-age child can manage much longer. Stretch the wait a little at a time, so your child mostly succeeds and learns that waiting is something they can do.
The story for this
The Passing Bowl
“Let the bowl come round.”
At a big table, the bowl comes round to everyone in time. A story about wanting your share, waiting your turn, and trusting it will reach you.
Hear the story → Mark made Stoic Sprout as a dad in Melbourne, for his own young children, with calm stories drawn from the real Stoic philosophers. More about Mark →
Small stories for big feelings.
Calm tales from the real Stoic philosophers, with a phrase your child can keep. A few are free to try.