Slowing Down
In today's society, slowing down is a four-letter word. We are not encouraged to take our time to find and conduct the best work we do.
Yes, there are times when we have deadlines and moments when we say "yes" too often. We may feel we have to say yes to succeed, have our family love us, or be seen by others that we are superheroes.
In my short 40 years on this planet, I have not come across anyone that says "I hope I suck at work today." We all want to be great at what we do.
When I was forced to slow down in my life due to overcoming a serious illness, I went through moments of depression and a lack of self-worth. In my past, I was addicted to startup entrepreneurship that is always moving hard and fast. Society and colleagues encouraged me to keep moving fast, ignore my body, and work through pain and fatigue. I did not want to feal weakly or not good enough. Due to my scripts of how I needed to operate to be great and the script reinforced by Facebook, business books, and the perceived success stories that are fed into our ears and eyes daily.
I kept moving, and as a result, the work I produced was not my best. Because the work I produced was not my best, it reinforced the feeling of not being good enough, and over many years this cycle continued. Like our health, one event does not determine the reason we may not feel our best.
Let's take a look at what may be happening in your life:
You begin working longer hours
Your family and your obligations grow
Stress increases
The food choices we make degrade, for example, you chose fast food vs. the organic salad you brought to the office. If you did this one-time per week, you probably would not notice a significant health difference. It is the act of continuing this cycle regularly that will eventually force you to slow down.
I do not want you to be forced because that comes with fear, pharmaceuticals, and down a path that could make you worse.
For the majority of us, what got us stressed out, and sick did not happen overnight. It was a long silent journey to get you into an unhealthy life. The journey to healing happens the same way.
Living a healthy life does not just happen by cooking and experimenting with healthy food, which will help, but a big part of healing is slowing down. To heal we need to slow down all aspects of our life.
This statement may make you angry, and your internal voice may be saying this guy has no idea what the hell he is talking about and slowing down is impossible.
I am not challenging you to make a drastic change; I am encouraging you to take the little steps to begin moving in a healing direction.
THREE STEPS TO BEGIN SLOWING DOWN
Chew your food 30 times per bite (slowly)
I know this may seem impossible but digestion begins with your first bite, and when we eat quickly, we are not allowing our food to properly digest. Due to improper digestion, we can have an upset stomach, not obtaining the full nutrients from food. This can lead to a vicious cycle of overeating along with many other things. Staying out of this cycle helps you take control. Feeling that you are in control along with feeling better will help you make positive choices.
Meditation (even for 2 min)
Taking time to look within, will allow you take control of your self-worth. We all have negative self-talk, and we beat ourselves up, and most or all of it is not true. By slowing down and looking within, we can start to see the truth of the negative voice in our heads. We can be empowered to say yes to things that help us and no to the things that will perpetuate stress. The more often we say no without guilt, the more time we will have to do great work.
Chose healthy organic foods
If you were going to drive your car across the country, you would not fill it with bad gas that has water in it. If you did, you are not going to make it very far. This is what we do to our bodies. We are demanding our bodies to run a competitive race, but we keep putting bad fuel in our tanks. This bad fuel leads to the vicious cycle of not feeling well, not producing the work that makes us feel good and doctors selling pharmaceuticals to fix the symptom but not address the cause. Take the time to plan your meals grazing slowly with proper foods or drive to a trusted restaurant that serves healing foods.
THESE THREE STEPS WILL START YOUR JOURNEY TO INCREDIBLE HEALTH
Your body did not get into this state due to just one event. It is a series of multiple events that created your current state.
Starting with these three simple steps will lead you to more actions that will improve your well being, for example, exercise.
At times when I feel I am not making a difference, I think of the quote from Confucius, "It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop."
Never stop moving towards the ideal healthy life you deserve.
