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Slowing Down Isn't Enough, and A Lofi Livestream
This Week's Note
Slowing Down Isn't Enough
While the degree may vary, it seems that we are naturally bent towards sprinting through life. We quickly run from one meeting to the next, frantically check items off our to do lists, stack our schedules, and shudder when there’s nothing left for us to do. In the event we’re dissatisfied with our dogged approach, a bleeding-edge platitude to “slow down” is offered as an immediate salve. For those barley managing to keep up, being told to slow down can feel insulting, and even if the phrase doesn’t fall on deaf ears, it only offers a fraction of the overall solution.
To truly slow down, to legitimately find ourselves not sprinting through life, it helps to bifurcate our approach. The first segment address the reasons why our pace is so break-neck in the first place. In essence, we must understand why we are drawn to consistently running more quickly than we should. Is it our work culture, have we been consuming harmful media, is there something we’re unknowingly anxious about? Whatever the reason may be, the initial step of slowing our pace will likely result in becoming content with doing and achieving less. When we become adept at intentionally limiting ourselves short list of to do’s and saying “no” become trusted companions.
The second branch of our bifurcated approach is to actually change our Pace Formula (P=A/T). To slow things down, we can either: decrease the amount of things we do, increase the time we have to do them, or even both. With the Pace Formula in mind we can easily see that we run fast when we stack our projects and cutback how much time we have to work through them. Alternatively, our pace slows when we consistently do less and afford our selves ample (or even egregious amounts of) time.
On the surface, the Pace Formula can seem reserved for those who have complete control over their schedules, but it can actually be a helpful tool for everyone. Sure, we may find that some responsibilities cannot be changed, some deadlines cannot be moved, and some timelines cannot be altered, but what about everything else? What about our ability to be content with doing less? What about being comfortable with a lengthy timeline?
Ultimately the Pace Formula (and slowing down in general) is not concerned with a privileged, mystic approach to a “well balanced life.” What we truly find when we change our pace and do less things over a longer period of time is that our dreams, our hopes, our projects are actually achievable. We learn that our passions don’t have to require an untenable amount of privilege to be pursed. When we creatively change our approach to how we get things done we enable ourselves to craft a solution informed by our specific context, and become well on our way to sustainably pursuing what we value most.
This Week's Resource
​A charming lofi live stream with a customizable interface from the lofi record label Chill-Hop. if you've been taking a break from media platforms, but still love relaxing music, this could be worth your time!
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