Slow

“How did it get so late so soon?”

(Dr. Seuss)

I’m trying to change my relationship to time.

Which is not straight forward in a world where we are constantly told that time is running out.

We should not waste time, time is precious, time is a gift, time is our most important resource, time is life, we must manage time, we are killing time. Or maybe time is killing me?

As I slowly unstitch myself from the workaholic tendencies that have dominated my recent years, I realise how my identity has been tightly intertwined with the capacity to get things done. Look, there are a few minutes left in the day; let’s just do that one last thing.

Except, of course, the last thing is never the last thing.

Our world is charmingly, beautifully infinite and a to do list full of scored out items is just a pale illusion of completion and achievement.

So, as we rush though pandemics, ecological chaos and social collapse, I realise that sustainability and resilience does not arise from the brittle fragility of quick-fire instrumental transactions or our attempts to master time.

Standardised time, the signature of our contemporary western world is a paradoxical gesture. The jet that would take us away to our week of timeless, restful relaxation departs to a precise schedule and as the days pass, we begin to fear the punctuality of the return flight.

To fully occupy our lives, we need to develop the slow skills of attention, stillness, discernment and consideration; skills that build appreciation, trusting relationships and foster community endeavour.

David Whyte asks us to, ‘…begin the day not with a to do list but with a not to do list, a moment outside of the time-bound world in which it can be reordered and reprioritised.’

Slowing down helps us reorder our relationship to both this moment and to our collective future.

It’s important to know that it’s not too late…

Addendum

I’m deeply indebted to @JamesAldridge4 who, in response to this blog, sent this:

Now we will count to twelve
and we will all keep still
for once on the face of the earth,
let's not speak in any language;
let's stop for a second,
and not move our arms so much.

It would be an exotic moment
without rush, without engines;
we would all be together
in a sudden strangeness.

Fishermen in the cold sea
would not harm whales
and the man gathering salt
would not look at his hurt hands.

Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victories with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.

What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.

Life is what it is about...

If we were not so single-minded
about keeping our lives moving,
and for once could do nothing,
perhaps a huge silence
might interrupt this sadness
of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with
death.

Now I'll count up to twelve
and you keep quiet and I will go.

(Pablo Neruda)

Thanks, James.

Notes:

The ‘ancient’ Greek thinkers used the terms Chronos and Kairos to distinguish between two modalities of time. Chronos referred to the notion of time as quantitative, measurable; the quantity of duration or the length of a period. Kairos relates to the right time, a qualitative relationship to time, the perfect moment when fate or destiny can change.

Take a look at David Whyte’s ‘Consolations’; a book which encourages us to slow down and contemplate the quality of simple, every day words that configure and structure our lives.

I’m also a fan of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s ‘Finding Flow’ where he looks at our quality of engagement with life and the way in which we experience time.

See also: