The Art of Hastening Slowly

The Art of Hastening Slowly

Do you ever catch yourself hurrying out of habit? Dashing through traffic by switching lanes around slower drivers? Becoming impatient with the person at the front of the grocery store line who fumbles with their credit card? Waking up in the morning and finding your mind is already jumping ahead to what you must do later that afternoon? If so, then perhaps you’ve uttered the prayer: Give me patience, oh Lord. And make it snappy!

It’s been studied that people’s attention spans have been shortening, possibly due to our high-tech world. A simple example is the telephone. In ancient times, like when I was growing up, we had rotary dial phones, which meant we had to wait for the rotation of each number to circle around before starting on the next. Now phones allow us to breeze through our speed dial list within a matter of seconds. And if you can multi-task, such as loading up the espresso machine, while texting your broker, during a phone call to mom, then you’re really cooking! Yet with all these souped-up gadgets, it does beg the question: Who’s the beast and who’s the master?

While patience may be a virtue, perhaps in today’s reality it’s becoming more of a necessity. Slowing down and being in the present moment allows us to get in touch with our lives. Otherwise, the precious moments of our life slip unnoticed through our busy fingers. In spiritual growth, take one step and let tomorrow’s step take care of itself.

To lose patience is to lose the battle.

~ Mahatma Gandhi

Patience, by its very definition, is a process and not a destination, and thus requires retraining of the mind. Dr. Richard Carlson, a psychotherapist and author, writes, “You can start with as little as five minutes and build up your capacity for patience, over time. Start by saying to yourself, Okay, for the next five minutes I won’t allow myself to be bothered by anything. I’ll be patient. What you’ll discover may be truly amazing. Your intention to be patient, especially you know it’s only for a short while, immediately strengthens your capacity for patience. Patience is one of those special qualities where success feeds on itself. Once you reach little milestones – five minutes of successful patience – you’ll begin to see that you do, indeed, have the capacity to be patient even for longer periods of time. Over time, you may even become a patient person.”

Slowing down in a life where a high premium lies on the twin deities of speed and convenience, may frankly require, mindfulness. Or, as the 18th century German novelist and poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote, “The things that matter most should never be at the mercy of the things that matter least.”

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