Slow

Faster.

Faster has always been my raison d’etre. Go further. Go faster. Push. Do the thing. Do another thing. Do the most things. Be the person who has gone the furthest, fastest with the most accolades and the most gold stars.

In my vocabulary and the vocabulary of those around me, slow was always derogatory.

Slow was something you said about someone who just didn’t get it.

Slow was someone who couldn’t keep up. Wasn’t good enough.

Slow was something someone tactless said about another child ‘Timmy’s a little slow, isn’t he?’

I never wanted to be associated with the word slow ever.

I remember there was a merry go round at my elementary school playground. At recess it was one of the more popular attractions. It was huge and maybe ten or more kids could fit on it. We would all start pushing together. Running and pushing. The slower kids would hop on. Then medium speed kids would hop on. Johnny was the fastest and he would hop on last. It was always a point of pride for me to keep pushing until just before Johnny would hop on.

I needed to be fast.

I still need to be fast. Despite living in a city, not on a race track, it was vital to me to have a car that had three hundred and fifty horsepower. For context the average horsepower range in the US is one eighty to two seventy. I needed more.

I need to be first off the line.

I need the flash, the rev, the roar.

So when discussing New Year’s Visions and someone said slow, it knocked me over.

I don’t think I have ever heard anyone mention slow in a positive way before.

To vision slow?

To envision slow?

To want slow?

I was baffled.

More than that I was intrigued.

Enticed.

What would it be like to have a slow life?

To not have to do everything?

To not be the best?

To not keep up with the Joneses.

On the drive home it echoed in my brain.

Slow.

When the right turn lane was blocked and I couldn’t get past to make my turn.

Slow

When a woman’s coupon didn’t work at the self checkout and I had to wait for the cashier to come help her before I could begin my transaction.

Slow.

When my dog wanted to sniff the entire length of the sidewalk outside daycare before getting in the car.

Slow.

When I took two trips from the car instead of trying to carry everything at once.

Slow.

What could a slow life look like?

What do I want to spend time slowly savoring?

I have glimpses of this in my life.

A slow Sunday morning where there is nothing to do and no where to be. I wake up and repeat to myself that there is nowhere I need to go in this moment. My dog army crawls across the bed to get right in my face for morning scritches. The sunlight filters through the blinds. I watch it play on the fabrics draped over the blanket ladder. I wrestle my brain to stay here warm under the covers and not head out into doing mode, not head out into the fast paced world.

My first impulse when I wake up in the morning is urgency.

Fast is a hard habit to break. I wake up and my first thought in the morning is what do I need to do?

Not how do I want to spend my day?

Not what do I want to experience?

Not how do I feel today?

Not what do I need?

Not how can I take care of myself today?

Slow feels like a threat. It asks me to be here with myself and those around me. When I go slow I can feel every bit of my body from my feet to my hair. I can feel any aches and pains I might have. I can feel every emotion so much more intensely.

Have you ever sat for just a minute? Watched a stop watch for a full minute. Been present for an entire minute.

It is excruciating. A minute is so much longer than I ever thought it was. To stop and fully experience a minute is agony.

With fast, I don’t have to be present. I can leap into a thousand different projections of how it will be when I am done being fast. Where I could go. Who I could become. None of them are ever true. But that doesn’t matter. With fast, I was achieving. With fast, I was winning. With fast, I was being seen, loved, and adored.

As a chronic people pleaser, fast got me love. ‘Look how much I did for you so fast!’ I could exclaim. I want to feel love and feeling love meant doing things for others and doing it fast.

I go fast because there is a part of me with something to prove. That part of me wants to stand on some imaginary pedestal, the number one spot, and say to everyone, ‘hey, look at me. I did it.’ and be lavished with praise.

I often forget that life isn’t a rat race to the finish line piling on gold stars to win.

So if it isn’t that. What is it instead?

What does a slow life look like?

I want to know, what can slow create?