Do you find yourself jumping out of bed when the alarm goes off? Your heart is racing, your feet on the floor, you are already down the stairs ready to get things done before your mind has barely registered that you are awake. You haven’t learned about Slow Living then.
The practice of Slow Living is a mindful choice. Where we slow down to live in the now. When we slow down, we allow ourselves to be more present. As a result, we can experience the moment instead of rushing through it. Slowing down can help us to be more productive. We can take time to think through tasks and make better decisions.
1. Do One thing at a Time
By focusing on one thing at a time we get more done. Multi-tasking takes more time to accomplish multiple tasks just by the simple fact that you are taking time to switch from one thing to another.
2. Do it Slowly and Deliberately
When you do something more slowly, you’re more intentional and can make it smooth. Smooth means high-quality. High quality is effective, which means you make better progress in the long run.
3. Do it Completely
According to the American Dictionary, a task is an activity or piece of work that you have to do, usually as part of a larger project. In our case, the bigger project is just life and we work at that every day. Remember to be flexible and to give yourself grace if you get turned in another direction before finishing a task. Our goal is peaceful Slow Living.
4. Do Less – More Slowly
This runs along with the next item on the list too because when you begin to put space between things there is less to do. Here are things to do instead, do make eye contact and enjoy your loved ones. Do make time to hear them when they speak and talk when they are listening. My favorite time of day is when the Farmer and I sit and chat about our day, and our plans for tomorrow, next week, and even next year.
5. Put Space Between Things
I have spent the last year getting rid of the broken things I will never fix, the old things that are worn out. I have been reducing my clutter and emotional baggage. The “good” china is for daily use at both the farm and the cottage. I have been pulling out the things that I love that have been packed away to keep them safe for the future. The time is now to have the things I love around me and get rid of all the broken and worn-out things that were just taking up space in between.
6. Develop Your Slow Living Rituals
The above-mentioned listed step is slowly evolving for us. It’s been quite the slow dance to find and develop a ritual that comfortably fits two people. It is the way that must go here, we are determined to live in peace and harmony. I find that after spending lives with unharmonious people we both tend to jealously guard bits of rituals that have brought us each separately our bits of sanity. Learning to lower walls and fully develop compatible rituals in a peaceful loving way is both amazing and fulfilling. We continue to move forward with this one daily.
7. Designate Time for Certain Things
I’m finding that we tend to live by the clock and the calendar, thus by the seasons. I have a nice little day planner that I write all my activities in and that’s how I keep track of where the Farmer and I need to be daily. I used to faithfully buy a farmer’s almanac every year and struggle with trying to decipher all the planting, harvest, and weather information for our area out of all the chaos inside but then I got wise and bought a planner with only one set of information created for this side of the planet.
This is the 2024 Planner that I just got. It has all the Moon phases and tells you which days are good to plant and harvest. It also has wonderful herbal information and recipes. As long as I know what day is good to plant, I don’t need to know the exact moment that it’s best to put the seed in the ground because I would probably just stress myself out trying to hit that elusive time frame.
Slow living fosters a profound sense of fulfillment and harmony by prioritizing sustainability, self-care, and balance. It aligns beautifully with practices like organic gardening, seasonal cooking, and nature-inspired routines, allowing individuals to live more in tune with the rhythms of the earth and their well-being.
Slow Living is a process and a practiced movement. Be realistic and give yourself some grace. There’s always tomorrow to pull in another string.
Peace, Kirsten
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