Sometimes the biggest changes are found in the smallest moments

Patience... if I'm honest, it was never one of my strongest qualities.

I always wanted to keep moving. To get things done. To move on to the next task.

I noticed it most in the small moments of everyday life. Waiting in a queue at the supermarket. Walking through an airport behind people who were moving more slowly than I wanted. I would feel an inner restlessness, as though everything needed to happen faster. Waiting felt like wasted time.

For many years, I simply believed that was part of my personality.

Until I began exploring systemic work more deeply.

Systemic work invites us to look not only at who we are, but also at the patterns and beliefs we have unconsciously inherited from our family system. Sometimes the traits we believe belong to us have their roots somewhere else entirely.

That was a profound realisation for me.

In my family, hard work and keeping a fast pace were simply part of daily life. My grandparents ran a dry-cleaning business from their home. It was open throughout the day and often well into the evening. Work and family life were closely intertwined. Serving customers, washing, ironing and grabbing something to eat whenever there was time all happened side by side.

My father grew up in that environment. For him, it was completely natural that everything had to happen quickly and that there was always something to do.

When I recognised that pattern, something began to change.

Not because I decided to become more patient. Not because I tried harder.

Simply because I understood where that inner restlessness came from.

Awareness alone made a difference.

These days I notice that I can simply wait.

I can walk behind someone at a slower pace without becoming irritated. The constant sense of urgency that once felt so familiar has gradually been replaced by a feeling of calm.

They may seem like small changes.

Yet it is often these small everyday moments that reveal how much has shifted on the inside.

This is something I frequently see after a systemic constellation as well. The insights do not always appear during the session itself. Often the real transformation begins afterwards. One day you suddenly realise that you are responding differently in an ordinary situation. Something that felt completely automatic for years is simply no longer there.

That, to me, is the true power of systemic work.

Every time I find myself standing patiently in a queue, I smile.

It reminds me that something inside me has changed, not because I worked harder, but because I became aware.