19/03/2024
Which of these are you already doing?
𝐖𝐄𝐀𝐕𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐒𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐍𝐄𝐒𝐒 (Part 2 of ‘Making Meaning inside Hamster Wheels’ 🐹 🛞)
We live so much of every day in a tumbleweed. Unconsciously. Going through the expected motions and hitting the required deadlines…
A significant part of slowing down is all about noticing… awareness… conscious living…
Here’s five ideas- just choose one. Whichever one seems most doable. Most achievable. Nothing complicated or overwhelming. Try it just for one week. Keep it going if it’s helping clear some of that mental clutter that’s keeping you trapped in the spinning wheel.
1️⃣ Set some kind of notification to alert you three times a day. (Randomly placed Post-it notes are also amazing for this! 🤓) At these times, pause whatever you are doing (you really just need one minute here).
Inhale deeply 🧘, and notice something beautiful or interesting in the space around you. Anything. Natural. Man-made. An attribute of a coworker. Sky’s the limit here.
Why this helps? 🎯 We live in a blur. Life is so fast-paced that in the rush of it, we seldom remember the moments of our days.
This simple ‘pause to notice’ practice is a powerful way to consciously take note of meaningful people, places, beings and things in our environment. 🍃
2️⃣ Boundary time to actually, really, put your phone away. On silent. Very away. Out of checking reach and definitely out of sight. Eliminate all temptation. 📱
Most stats say we check our phones between 144 and 200 times a day… Oooo… Could be true… 😬
And every time we do (even when we haven’t heard the ‘beep’ notification) we are swept into a world and a reality outside of the one that we are actually living in. Away from those we have the potential to connect with and make memories with. Elsewhere.
But here, now, in this moment with these people is where we have the best chance of living fully and finding stillness and slowness. 🫶🏽
(The fact that here-and-now relationships are so much better for our mental health than social media comparisons is a whole other post, but you get where I am going.)
Find even thirty minutes a day to put your phone out of earshot, sight and reach, and just BE. With those you love. With yourself. However. With whoever. But just be in this moment now.
3️⃣ And on that same note, find one moment in the morning ☀️ and one in the evening 🌙, and as many as you can in between (note I didn’t even say ‘one minute’ because you just need one moment!)
Bring yourself back to a conscious awareness of NOW. 🧘 Check in/ tune in with YOURSELF. Your nervous system.
Our rapid world has us ‘tuned out’ from ourselves and those we love. We largely live in a state of hyper vigilance and survival. 😳
Turn that around. Tune in. Find quiet. 🌳
Ask yourself: What’s going on within? Where am I at today? Notice.
It’s amazing how just noticing and acknowledging our space enables compassion.
And compassion gives us permission to slow… permission to breathe… permission to BE. 🫶🏽
4️⃣ Physically DO things slower. Be more snail-like. (Yip- I did say that. It’s a real thing, and from personal experience, this really, really works!) 🐌
Drive slower. Walk slower. Eat slower. Take a few seconds longer.
It’s amazing how a physically slower pace calms the heart rate, regulates the nervous system and generally brings us far more in tune with ourselves.
5️⃣ Take ten minutes a day to sit quietly in nature. 🌳🍃☀️
Find a tree, a rock, a patch of grass. Take off your shoes. Focus on what you feel between your toes.
Feet (sock-less and shoe-less) have an incredible way of grounding us. Bringing us to the now. 👣
And when we can just be in this exact moment, in the NOW, the whole world slows down 🌎 and so much of the generally erupting chaos falls into perspective (I have personally had plenty of ‘deep’ grounding moments with the big old oak tree in my garden!)
And actually, let’s make it six things- just one more. 😉
This one has proved pretty amazing in my life:
6️⃣ A Two-minute Night Time Reflection. ✨
Just two minutes out of 24 hours ⏰- when put in context, that’s very doable and I promise, it’s so worth it.
Write down one thing you learnt today, one you noticed today- about yourself, your relationships, your kids, the world around you…
This simple practice enables us to find uniqueness in otherwise ‘washing machine’ days🌪️ , and makes them so much more meaningful.
When we can do this, it’s not one blur of a week/ month/ year gone by…
Even on the hard ones, we’re harnessing every day that life has to offer. 🌱
So much happiness is in finding purpose and meaning.
This simple practice enables us to go to sleep knowing, “This one mattered because…”
In the smallest ways, everyday we can claim back time, slow down that rapidly moving second hand, and find ways to breathe meaning and life into living.🍃
“You will find meaning in life only if you create it. It is a poetry to be composed. It is a song to be sung. It is a dance to be danced.” ~ Rajneesh.
With love and about to do that reflection,
Naomi ♥️
