Go slowly.

Go Slowly.  Give thanks.  Write down your thanks.  This piece of health advice comes from my sister Debbie.  Thanks Debbie.  It’s not an easy one, but one that you challenged me to take on.

Many of us have read Ann Voskamp’s book A Thousand Gifts and I know a lot of people who did just that.  Wrote down a thousand gifts in their life.  I did it last year.  I got to 900 and then stopped.  Probably it needs to be a daily practice.  She has a devotional journal you can purchase at her blog site in order to complete the 1000 items. http://www.aholyexperience.com/

Dare to live fully, right where you are.  That is the mantra of the site and the book.  I think this is the right idea.

When I take my students to Ghana, I ask them to breathe.  To breathe in each moment and not rush.  Now, Africa makes you slow down because time moves at a much different pace and you find yourself waiting A LOT.  What we learn is that by waiting, we think not better, but differently. And this difference is all the importance in the world.  But what you have to remember to do is to breathe.

You can actually CHANGE the chemistry of your body by taking ten slow deep breaths.  You will reduce cortisol in your body and increase serotonin release.  Try it before eating.  Try it before walking into a difficult situation.  Try it before anything that might cause any form of anxiety.   Here is the exercise I recommend that I learned from my first voice teacher about two decades ago:

1.  Count to three in your head.

2.  Draw a breath in about ¾ of the way.

3.  Let it sit.  Count to three in your head again.

4.  Gently let it out and create a vacuum in your lungs by getting all the air out.

5.  Repeat 10 times.

After I started doing this in times of challenging difficulty, I noticed a difference.  I also started to do it before eating.  Part of giving thanks for my food.  And it made a difference.

Then I found this website dedicated to the psychology of eating:  http://psychologyofeating.com/about-marc-david/

And here they are dedicated to slow, mindful eating and living.  It is a great place to begin if you feel that you are rushing through life, eating too fast and just not enjoying life fully. 

Slowing down is really hard in our culture.  Tonight I had the chance to sit and have a bowl of soup with my dad (soup I had made earlier in the day) and we spent about an hour lingering over our soup and a glass of red wine.  It was lovely.  Savoring every delicious sip and bite. Slow.  Nothing expected.  Just nice.

And I think we do not get this often enough.  I love one of the exercises that Marc David, the founder of the Psychology of eating, has one of his students do.  This particular student eats Big Macs (two of them) every day for lunch and he is a doctor!  Anyway, he asks this doctor to just do one thing.  Eat the Big Macs slow.  Take a whole hour to eat them.  And the doctor cannot do it.  When he starts eating the Big Macs slow, he realizes that they taste awful.  And so he gave up McDonalds and moved on to better food once he realized, by slowing down his eating, that McDonalds does not taste like food at all!

So, I would ask of myself and of you to slow down.  Breathe in every moment.  Wait.  Let things settle.  Who cares if you’re a little late?  Who cares if you think you’re too busy.  You’re not.  None of us are.  Take some time.  Write down one thing you are thankful for every single day of your life.  Write it down.  Look at the writing.  Breathe with the writing.  And then move on.  But slow.

As I was writing this, I thought of a poem by Theodore Roethke about going slow.  This is just a beautiful vision of things:

The Waking

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.   

I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.   

I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?   

I hear my being dance from ear to ear.   

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Of those so close beside me, which are you?   

God bless the Ground!   I shall walk softly there,   

And learn by going where I have to go.

Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?   

The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;   

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Great Nature has another thing to do   

To you and me; so take the lively air,   

And, lovely, learn by going where to go.

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.   

What falls away is always. And is near.   

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.   

I learn by going where I have to go.