We have been brainwashed to believe that fast is exciting. Your favorite actor speeds away at an unimaginable pace in the latest flick, a lady speaking fast gets her way through the check-out counter, a colleague takes pride in finishing a 600-page novel in three hours and the chef chops 50 onions in 50 seconds. All this leaves everyone in awe.
Somehow, we have been made to believe that slowing down is a dumb act. Is it really so? hope you would agree that what finally matters is the quality of the result. We live in the world of crises. Everyone wants it to be done right away. Barring some rare instances, I have had many clients who were after my life for the design to be completed, once we sent for approval, the mail stayed unchecked for days. By the way, I do not intend to advise the ambulance driver to slow down, but such conditions are rare.
How many times you’ve regretted clicking the ‘send’ button without proofreading the email? How many times you’ve struggled to recover the data you deleted without thinking? How many times you felt to need to call again after dropping the phone? How many times did you reach home realising not to have picked one last thing at the supermarket? How many times you had to start a creative project all over again because it was not up to the mark? How many times did you want to share one more thing with the class teacher about your child?
At the core of each of these instances, if you had taken that extra minute, you would not have that regret. Speed is something not necessarily to be celebrated.
Slow yourself down. When you take that extra minute, you add significant value to each of those tasks. Many love stories did not start because of the chase of time. Many wishes stayed unfulfilled because of the obsession for speed. Many feelings did not reach the intended because of the madness-infested deadlines.
You will find God in each of your acts every day, when you do it with love. And while in love you’re never in hurry.