The half-life of grace, or second-hand miracles

A friend offered me some secondhand clothes and I picked them today.  I appreciate this because a) it helps me extend my wardrobe, and b) I don't have to suffer any buyer's remorse.

I was thinking this morning about the miracle of longsuffering; how over time, indirectly, some of the longsufferer wears off on the suffered.  Maybe this is because I am so hard-headed and proud that you can't teach me anything; you have to show me.  That takes time, which puts the long in longsuffering.

If I could just learn everything directly for myself, I could experience more grace firsthand.  Sometimes, though, I don't even know what I'm missing.  I get around people who've got something special, and think, hmm, where  can I pick some of that stuff up?  Also, I have in the past bought some nice stuff second-hand, and really enjoyed the quality.  It made me more willing to pay the price for the real thing later on, and start counting that cost.  It's the same with spiritual blessings.

This idea makes me uncomfortable, too, because I realize how frequently the grace God shines into my life is  snuffed out by my own selfishness or fleshliness.  This is most evident when I am impatient or short with my children.  I guess sometimes I expect them to be little adults.  It's taken me XX years to arrive where I am, and it's not the finish line... clean or dirty, cute or frumpy, I've got some little wardrobes to launder and fold, and do it all again tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow... until they're big enough to take it all on their own.

The patience to do that would be a miracle that I am just hoping would have a secondhand effect.