Slow Down... You Move Too Fast
This is International Slow Down Week. Did you know?? Would you like to participate?
Keri Smith of Wish Jar Journal has a wonderful list of ways to slow down such as:
1. walk as slowly as you possibly can for at least 10 minutes.
2. sit in a busy place and do not move for 10 minutes.
3. give yourself permission to not answer the phone all week.
4. take half an hour to peel and eat an orange.
5. have a conversation with a squirrel.
I did that last one. Our very polite conversation included appreciation for the peanuts we provide said Squirrel, a complaint about his teasing our dogs including my fear that one will crash through our sliding door, and a frank discussion of Squirrel's stealing of bird seed and destruction of feeders.
I had to stop when Squirrel started quoting Shakespeare ("If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?" MV, Act III, Scene I). Maybe I slowed down just a little too much.
I'd add:
13. Visit a laundromat and do a load of laundry especially in a front loading machine. Watch the clothes spin and dance through the cycles.
14. Lie on the floor in corpse pose and count your breath. Try to reach 100 without giving up or falling asleep.
There were wonderful reactions to Keri's list in this comments. Especially this one from Alex:
Do we even know how to slow down anymore really? This post was fun and whimsical but it is also so very IMPORTANT in the
rawest, most crucial way because we are pacing ourselves and our
precious lives so quickly that we are out of step and out of touch with
ourselves and all that make this world so extraordinarily beautiful. Today, because of the snow, I was forced to walk slowly down to the
shop, and I noticed everything I never had before from the crazy lines
in the sidewalks to my own aging hands. Tomorrow I am going to do
number seven for sure, and try to do some more this week. Thanks!!
How can you choose to slow down?
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