June 8, 2022: Hear the Whispers?
I’m sitting on our deck watching people go by. A light breeze dances across the lake. Clouds partially cover a blue sky. A man slowly backs his boat trailer toward the water. (It will take him four tries.) Our overly-spoiled cat, who wears a harness to sit outside, peeks over the edge of the deck hoping a mouse or a chipmunk will blindly walk by. Across from me on the deck, my husband quietly looks down at his phone reading news articles.
Life is good and I should be enjoying this moment of quiet. Yet my mind races off in fourteen directions reminding me I haven’t yet weeded the front flower bed or put fertilizer on bushes. Inside laundry awaits as do a few other projects. I need to post some items for sale (I have no idea when I will find time for that), and I have a long list of other really "important" to-do items waiting, not to mention—what’s for dinner?
A few weeks ago, a quiet message began popping up everywhere.
“Slow Down.”
I heard it in song lyrics, in passing conversations, in tv commercials. I mean, everywhere. It's almost like the words are dancing in the wind and tickling my ears several times a day.
It began when we picked up our new-used Silverado. Moving from the Toyota FJ to the Silverado's massive body and V-8 meant a shift in perspective. I merely needed to touch the gas and this North Blue Sky behemoth rolls. She's one of those vehicles where you barely feel like you're moving and you look down and see you're exceeding the speed limit—by a lot. "Whoa, there, little lead foot! Better slow your roll!"
There. See? Right then. That's where it started.
Get in the truck. Buckle up. Start driving down the road. Then the reminder. Think slow. Think ease. Take it easy so as not to speed.
Yeah, but it didn't stop there. I began getting the "slow down" message from all around me.
Was it a message just for me? Or has the whole world gone to ludicrous speed with the need to back off, check the gas pedal, and find a place to peace out?
And what do "peace and quiet" look like? Feel like? Has it been so long we don't even remember?
Is it a stolen hour sitting on the deck—not worrying about the "to do" list? An evening watching a detective show without surfing the Internet at the same time? Or is it more than that?
Checking my email and deleting a collection of Ebay messages proposing items I may be looking for (mostly not), I found myself wondering how many other senseless maintenance tasks I do every day that could be totally eliminated.
Okay, so I don't want to stop things like brushing my teeth and making the bed—I still like to be clean and neat. Food still needs to be put on the table and, oh, yeah, paying the bills is still a thing. (I'd love to delete that!) But how many other useless tasks do we do every day that we simply could let go of and no one would care? Not doing them would free up time in our day we could use to—yeah— slow down.
More than that, are you hearing the whispers? Are you listening to the quiet inner voice telling you how to make the most of every day, how to be the best, happiest, healthiest you possible? Mine's telling me to "slow down." What's yours telling you?