Patience gets praised as a plain virtue — more is better. Innocent treats it as a tool instead, and tools are for the right job: “It is not everything and everyone that deserves my patience.”

His test is simple. Patience means giving something more time, hoping it will change. So the real question isn’t whether you’re patient enough — it’s whether more time will actually change this. When there are real signs it will, waiting pays. When there aren’t, impatience can serve you better.

The reason to be choosy is that time is the one thing you can’t get back. Spend it waiting on what won’t change, and patience turns into waste. Hence the line: “Patience is good, but selective patience is better.” Keep the virtue; just choose where it goes.