slowing down
February 22nd, 2009’“An olive won’t ripen any quicker, however much you mess with it.” (Tuscan Proverb)
Olive grove
We are time–addicts. Time-sick. We’ve come to feel our lives as tiredly, time-deprived. Time is our heroin. We mojo our lives trying to find ways to score more and more. Let’s add time for me. Time for you. There’s work, there’s exercise. There’s family time. Special time for e-mail. Oh, and then there’s organizing those seven hundred thirty-six digital photographs. I’ll save that for next month. That novel I’ve always wanted to read? I’ll make time next year.
We gorge ourselves, yet never end up satisfied. Our solution? More activity at even a faster pace. Speed reading, speed meditating, speed yoga. Let’s keep that rat-wheel turning. Speed up. Keep moving. That fix is coming. “I’ll move faster. Schedule my time better. I’ll find that plan so I can finally squeeze in every want, desire and need.”
We hire personal coaches, buy the latest scheduling technologies, we read dozens of books by time gurus. But, like a drug deal gone bad, the best laid plans go astray. We can’t open that vein to slip that last half-dozen activities in. Depression and anxiety ensues.
Queen, Under Pressure
In his book Slowness, Carl Honoré writes, “In this media-drenched, data-rich, channel-surfing, computer-gaming age, we have lost the art of doing nothing, of shutting out the background noise and distractions, of slowing down and simply being alone with our thoughts.”
We get a kick from going fast. Literally. Think roller coasters, and downhill skiing, and snowmobiles. Even rushing to and from work, or the yoga center, will give us that kick. There’s a heady surge of sensory input when we go fast. Adrenaline and noradrenaline shoot into our blood stream. Two chemicals released during sex; two chemicals tied to our most basic stress response. Fight or run.
When we start off our mornings in a mad-dash rush, we signal to our bodies DANGER DANGER. Even if we’re just driving to the library. We trigger our sympathetic nervous system into high gear. Then, it stays there for the rest of the day. Fight-or-flight with nothing really to fight, and nowhere to flee. Day in, day out. More hours in the day than not. It’s not the place in our bodies where we’re meant to make our home.
Our sympathetic nervous system is meant for special occasions, or periodic spurts during the course of the day. Say, when that lion is chasing us, or we haven’t eaten in days and we need that kill. Or, when times are good and we’re up for mating. Little surges of challenge here and there during our days are okay. Some stress is good for us. It invigorates our spirit, makes us more resilient. Like that sports car that occasionally you need to take onto the highway and rip open full-throttle.
Still, it’s the opposing parasympathetic nervous system where we find our true home. Eating figs by the watering hole, with nothing much to do but rest and digest, whether it’s food, or the day’s experiences.
It’s here in our parasympathetic nervous system where we consolidate memories, heal our bodies, digest our food, organize our thoughts, solve our problems, restore our sanity. We’re most creative when we slow down. Have a problem you’re trying to work through? You’re more likely to find that creative solution taking a bath, or brushing your teeth, or taking a stroll, or lollygagging in the back yard, than when racing into and through that next activity fix. Albert Einstein would sit in his Princeton University office for hours staring into space. He changed the world.
Our time addiction can be slowed. Take a day a week, or even just an evening or two, and ignore those Time tyrants. Forget those plans. Bring a spontaneous revolt to your soul. Throw off the self-help books, blackberries, e-mail, to-do lists, or that novel you were intending to read. To hell with yoga, meditation, the kid’s soccer game, the book club, and weeknight hockey. Tell your gurus and those pushers of personal growth to go jump in the lake.
Go outside and stare into the sky. Take off all your clothes. Or, turn off all the lights, build a fire, and watch the flames flicker and dance. Dare yourself for a day, a night, or even just an hour to live in the glow of knowing that time is forever and always at hand.
Simon and Garfunkel, Sound of Silence