I saw a commercial today with Neil Patrick Harris where he mentioned he use to play a doctor on tv. It was a comedy slash coming of age drama. I refuse to say that for a few weeks I watched the show religiously.

Harris noted how whatever he said in his doctor role was perfect. Every problem was solved in 30 minutes or less. He spoofed that fictional perfection in the commercial. His real life is far more complicated than his teenage characters. So are all of ours.

Many of us were raised to see life through the drama and stories of the television world. Real life is seldom like tv. On tv whatever the problem it was solved in 30 minutes to a hour.

Real life doesn’t work that way. Real life problems particularly the big kind take time and work. This time issue is so majorly different in real life compared to fantasy tv but we seldom really think about it. We begin to expect for resolutions to be quick. We think they should only take a few minutes or maybe a few hours. We think on the long side maybe a few days at max to work out the problem. Experience says that more often than not it takes months and in so cases years or longer to work out complex situations.

Life may be easier on tv but it isn’t real. Real life with all its problems is the greatest place to live out the drama of life. We must though be realistic with our expectations of time. We have to persevere and give ourselves time to work and for things to work out in the right timing.