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I have been a business owner for 5 years and an enthusiastic amateur gardener for 2. I find that my business has grown well, but slowly, in a manageable fashion these years and now I am at a stage where I can choose my clients (or at least pursue the ones I want to work with, with some confidence), take time off from work without huge guilt pangs and pay the household bills!

Evan Dando may have sung, “Patience is like bread they say, I ran out of that yesterday,” but patience is a virtue when building a business, as much as it is when gardening, learning a language or training a puppy.

1. Gardening – I was never a gardener until we moved to Portugal. To be frank, in London we had a concrete patio rather than 1,000m2 of land, so I never knew I had green fingers. That may still be an exaggeration, but I have enough patience to sow seeds and wait for them to germinate, watch the blossom on the trees turn to fruit and be able to harvest my rewards in the autumn.

2. Learning a new language – It has been SO difficult learning Portuguese, I can’t even begin to say how much. However, the compliments I receive from friends and acquaintances about my language give me the encouragement to keep going and those hours conjugating verbs are now paying off. It’s also a lot easier to get what you want out of the tax man if you speak his language!

3. Training a puppy – We had 2 dogs as a family; an old bitch named Penny who came from people who didn’t want her any more and a mad, mad puppy called Cass. Cass was nuts, seriously, and he owned us, rather than the other way around. We tried puppy classes, but got expelled. We tried bribery, but he was wise to us in weeks. The only person who had control over Cass was my Dad’s friend Greg, who knows a thing or two about bringing a dog to heal. But for the rest of us, and our neighbours, our patience was tested every day and on some days we were not very virtuous.

4. Driving a car – It took 3 attempts for me to pass my driving test. Driving a car looks like so much fun; you can go really fast; travel without asking your Mum for a lift; be the designated driver for months at a time… The first time I took my test it was against my instructor’s advice, but I went ahead anyway and road up the pavement while taking a left turn, nearly taking out a tree in the process. Not a good start. But with persistence and patience and a large amount of pocket-money I passed just after my 18th birthday. Just in time for college and those midnight assignations with the boyfriend.

5. Baking bread – You don’t need many ingredients to make a good loaf. Patience and a lot of kneading. Knead well, leave to rest. Return, punch out air, leave and knead again. All bread needs is a warm environment and a little time to grow.

About the Author:
Emma Crabtree is the owner and sole-operator of Red Box Virtual Office, an off-site business support service. Red Box Virtual Office can enable you to free yourself from the day to day admin of your business so that you can focus on what you enjoy and what makes you money. Find out more