“I’m so overwhelmed”, she says to me.
“I really think I’m built for a slower life. Life is crazy nowadays! There are so many things going on all the time. WhatsApp groups for every occasion, work, school, constant emails to answer... We have to keep on the move all the time, go to meetings, fetch and carry, run errands, sort out the house and family…
I don’t think this speed is in my nature. But that's how it is nowadays. What can I do about it?”
She's not really expecting an answer. She's sharing her frustration and expecting me to nod along and agree that that's just how it all is - because of course, it IS true.
Life can be really fast and busy nowadays.
She's certainly not expecting me to offer a solution of any kind.
But I don't nod along and agree that she's powerless in all this.
Because I believe we always have choices.
I listen to her, and when she asks her question at the end, "What can I do about it?", without giving it much thought, I quietly reply,
“Move slower.”
She blinks at me in surprised silence for a moment.
Then she bursts out laughing.
“It’s so simple, isn’t it? There I was assuming there's nothing I can do about it, yet it didn’t occur to me to simply take my need seriously and just go slower.”
If you loved yourself, how would you take your need seriously now?
