Slowing Down in a Fast-Paced World
In the waiting room for a lab test recently, I grew increasingly impatient as time passed. Then I grew impatient the longer it took to get the results. I didn’t use to be this way – but I’m not alone.
Many of us live at a fast-pace. We grow impatient when things move what seems slowly, not questioning whether our expectations for speed are reasonable or healthy. We eat quickly, hence the popularity of “fast-food.” We multi-task. We scurry around slow walkers, and research demonstrates that people walk faster than they used to. We get frustrated at slow drivers (who follow speed limits). We hate slow internet connections and waiting in customer service queues. We balk at slow grocery check-out lines and scurry to self-checkout. We’re grateful for TSA Pre-Check to avoid waiting in airport security lines. Speed at work is often expected, sometimes monitored and even rewarded. We feel pressure to respond promptly to emails and texts.
While living this way sometimes feels invigorating, as if we’re “at the top of our game,” it comes with costs. Multi-tasking has been shown to increase the chance for mistakes. We may become mentally, emotionally and/or physically tired, resorting to unhealthy energy shots of sugar, caffeine or pills to keep up our pace. Stress and frustration cause high blood pressure and its disease risks. We can’t structure our days as impatience leads to flitting from task to task, unable to concentrate for best results. Important things are delayed as seemingly urgent, unimportant ones demand immediate attention.
Experiments by McCombs School of Business assistant professor Annabelle Roberts found that impatience – expressed in the desire to just get tasks done - can lead to poor decision making. Her subjects preferred to pay more than necessary just to get a bill off their minds and do more than required, including unpaid overtime, just to finish a task. She attributed this to their need for closure, the psychological pressure to complete something. Overdone, the need for closure can be the enemy of slowing down.
Slowing down can, however, yield benefits. Laura Malloy of the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine reminds us that “slowing down isn’t about doing less, but doing more with greater focus and purpose and at the right speed.” It can lower stress and blood pressure as well as improve attentiveness and concentration. It can foster better social relationships at work and home as people experience our willingness to listen instead of our impatience to move on. “It can,” she notes, “help you become less forgetful about recent actions, like whether you locked the front door, turned off the stove, or took your medicine,” tasks especially important as we age. It can also heighten our appreciation for nature and the special people in our lives.
Living at too fast a pace is not a new problem. Socrates warned us to “beware the barrenness of a busy life.” Thomas Jefferson, on leaving his job as Secretary of State in late 1793, said “the motion of my blood no longer keeps time with the tumult of the world.” But if not new, it may be harder to contain due to modern technology, our global economy and the demands others place on us and that we place on ourselves.
We’re not condemned to living at too fast a pace. Dr. Tchiki Davis of Berkeley’s Well-Being Institute suggests inserting intentional pauses in our lives, time when we deliberately stop acting and step back to relax and think. Consider this as the equivalent of an adult “time out.” An important technique for doing so, she notes, is to find a quiet place. Even if we want to slow down, the pace of others around us can make this difficult, but we can do it. There’s a lovely scene in Pretty Woman where Richard Gere, a hard-charging investment tycoon, takes the advice of Julia Roberts to put work aside, take off his shoes and walk barefoot in the grass. Slowing down to do just that helps him make a critical decision to change his business strategy – and his life.
It’s also possible to turn off technology. We over-estimate how important it is to be immediately available. When you take a bathroom break, no one expects you to answer their text (though, sadly, some people take their phones into the bathroom). If we’re physically ill, the demand to move fast gives way to acceptance that we need to rest. We should give ourselves permission to take mental and emotional rest breaks too. Work demands, “bombshell news” and social media posts will still be there when we return.
Religions set aside a day of rest to remind us of the value of stepping back from the demands of daily life. The practice of mindfulness meditation is another vehicle that can relieve the stress, anxiety and depression that can come with living in the fast lane.
The comedian/actress Lily Tomlin once gave us some simple advice to deal with living at warp speed: “For fast-acting relief, try slowing down.”
Photo Credit: Carol Donsky Newell
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