Slow down and soak it up!

 Slow down and soak it up! 

I love this pinterest quote. It is something I have done myself over the last few years. I was working full time and bringing work home, cramming loads into my weekends and was rushing through life. I would not do this any differently because I feel I did fab things with my daughter and family and friends and made amazing memories. I am just ready, healthwise and emotionally, to slow down a bit more! I am so glad we fitted so many trips out, children's parties, workshops and visiting people. At times though, you are thinking about your next thing instead of fully enjoying what you are doing at that moment.

I didn't really get a choice in the slowing down. My body kind of did an emergency stop. I left teaching and started a new journey. I struggled at first and tried to claw back my old life. I have got my head around it now and when I need to rest, I see it as something I am doing. 

I used to be so busy. I was that hamster on the wheel, not getting anywhere but shattered all the time! Once you stop being busy, you feel  bit lost and very guilty for not being busy anymore. This quote made me think. You can be busy relaxing!

This quote is so true. In a society where people do feel they have to be busy, to look busy and to feel productive, there is a large onus on being this most of the time. I remember as a part time teacher, on job share with a class and teaching 1:1 and groups, I suddenly felt guilty that I wasn't putting the same hours in, the same effort in as before. And in comparison to my full time friends. I was still the same teacher but I somehow did not feel the same anymore. 

I was lucky to work four days a week after I became a mum, and guilt feelings aside, that one day was magical for us. I have lovely memories of that one day, a little breather in the week. And, of course the weekends! Where I did try to do it all! We crammed all sorts in. I don't now but I am so glad we did back then! Now, I am embracing the slower living, not squeezing as much into each day!

When I was teaching and juggling everything, I had lists galore! I think I have maybe rebelled from this time because my lists now are more mentally made or scribbled on the backs of envelopes! I cannot now write these long lists on To Do pads. Probably because they never got finished and the items on the To Do lists, especially at work had begun to overwhelm me slightly. I was a doer, a teacher. I performed the teaching side well but the other side with all the data, paperwork, forms, tick sheets and so on I had become to dread a little. I was at my happiest sat with the kids, teaching. Not writing stuff up after! I am not alone in this either! This is where the dreaded procrastination crept in and I would do all my interesting, creative lesson planning and marking, then leave my paperwork till last, being reminded of an email about a form I hadn't filled in, via email. I loved it when you could handwrite the form, there and then and get on with the teaching!

This is so important. I learned the hard way, as many of us do. We keep going and going until our health tells us other wise. Another guilt thing. We feel we have to keep going to not let anyone down. Then we end up letting folk down, especially ourselves. 

I have learned that the other thing you have permission to do, is to let stuff go. We hold onto things that happened, things we did but that just gets in the way of our healing. We do let go gradually but once we do, the relief of not putting yourself through that 'I should have' scenario is massive. Sometimes, we will never get closure or an understanding of a situation. Sometimes, we do not get the chance to give our side. We have to slowly come around to the fact that some people will not listen anyway or will think differently, depending on what they have heard and experienced. You cannot use all your energy up trying to convince certain folk. It is really not worth it.

I have reached this point in my life, as have others I know. It is like you reach saturation point of worrying, over thinking, analysing, making excuses for people, trying to be the peacemaker with folk and taking stuff on with certain people who are not prepared to be there for you. The list goes on! 

This is brilliant! Do not just slow down your social life and stop your rushing from one thing to the next, slow down yourself! I love the slowing your breathing. I am meditating weekly and the breathing has really helped. The last part of the quote is fab too as I was always over reacting to stuff people said, before thinking about it. I took things personally, without thinking whether what was said was aimed at me or just meant as a joke.