KT18 Word Line
がまん
我慢
Gaman
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Meaning
endurance, putting up with it
Holding back pain or desires. Today it is mostly used approvingly.
Example
言い返したいのを我慢して、会議が終わるまで黙っていた。
I resisted the urge to answer back and kept quiet until the meeting ended.
Origin
In Buddhism it was one of the seven kinds of pride (shichiman) and had a negative meaning: the mind that, convinced it has a self, rates itself highly and looks down on others. Later, from the idea of clinging to oneself, it came to mean being self-willed or stubborn, and that strength of will turned into the positive sense of enduring patiently.