Slow Down, People Breathing
Everywhere I go this mid-summer season everyone is saying the same thing: summer is flying and I’m too busy and I can’t fit everything in and I’m tired and summer is too short and too full and it’s wearing me out and I’m too booked and too, too too you fill in the blank. Yikes! Stop. I mean it. Stop right now and rest. I know, it’s revolutionary but really stop and rest. Take a nap in the park. Sit on your deck or porch or stoop and do absolutely nothing. Just breathe. There, that’s enough. Look around. Breathe some more. Do it for ten or twenty or ninety minutes. Sit and do nothing and breathe and look around you. See the weeds, but don’t get up and pull them. Remember the clothes left in the washing machine for days, but don’t get up and move them. Hear the phone ring, but don’t answer it. Sit. Look. Breathe. Slow summer down by slowing down.
Take your time.
Time flies when we multitask and rush. Time slows down when we do. Don’t hurry, really wherever you are going, go slowly. Don’t hurry. You have enough time today to enjoy the day. Repeat this to yourself a few times and then live your day as if you believed this to be so. You don’t need to hurry. Take your time. Practice saying it to your loved ones, including yourself.
I recently read that most Americans start their day by telling themselves that they didn’t get enough sleep and then spend their day telling themselves and others that they don’t have enough time. No wonder we are all feel so tired and inadequate and stressed out.
I got enough sleep last night and I have enough time today. What a relief. It must be true. I have the same number of hours as everyone else on the planet. It’s enough. It is what is. Only a complete non- Buddhist stress junkie would argue against this simple truth. I am going to believe it. I am going to trust it. I am going to lean into the idea of enough and I am going to love it. On my stoop, in the park, waiting for a train, walking here and there to my car, into Cash Wise, slowly because I have enough time.
I have enough time and I got enough sleep. Summer will last as long as it is suppose to and then Fall will come at just the right time. I will not multi-task my way out of enjoying it, out of even noticing it and loving it. I will breathe and sit still and breathe again. I will slow time down by slowing down. I will not multi-task. I will not hurry. I will say to you, don’t hurry, take your time and mean it. It’s a revolution. Let’s start it.
Slow down