Patience for the Spastic

I have known for quite a while that I have little innate patience for spastic or misbehaving animals. Part of it is the power struggle - I want living creatures to bend to my will. Part of it (in the case of the spastic) is frustration at something with poor apparent intelligence.

I had little akin to love for the teaching dog I was trying to do a neuro exam on today. I was attempting to do a pupillary light response test (shine light in the animal's eye, see if the pupil constricts) and the canid kept pulling back its head. Attempt a reflex check on a foreleg, and the dog kept trying to get out of my assistant's grasp. I guess it regarded me as an evil torturer, some frightening being with only death in my plans for it. Well, not before I started, but after... naw, I'm joking - but my charitable emotions were taxed and depleted more than normal.

I don't suppose I am required to like or even agape-love animals. However, I think that anger at anything is wrong if allowed to persist (and if frustration/anger toward animals becomes a habit, it may transfer over to humans).

There are some areas of my life where I have recognized failure and badly wanted the opportunity to be faced with the issue again, soon, so I could practice doing things right and prove to myself/others that I had improved. As for the matter at hand, it looks like I will have ample opportunity to practice quelling anger and being patient. Our teaching dogs, crazy client-owned animals, the clients themselves...