Slowing Time Down {Book Club}

Lion's Bay, BC

"On every level of life, from housework to heights of prayer, in all judgment and efforts to get things done, hurry and impatience are sure marks of the amateur." 

- Evelyn Underhill

This quote, in Chapter 4 of One Thousand Gifts, stopped me dead in my tracks. This feeling to hurry up, to rush — why is that, I wonder? And "quick quick quick," I tell my kids —what is that all about? Always frazzled and rushing about, so that I can do what? Wake up in the morning so that I can do it all over again? That doesn't make much sense and definitely does not produce a God-glorifying attitude in my home. I am living like an amateur.

"I don't really want more time; I just want enough time. Time to breathe deep and time to see real and time to laugh long, time to give You glory and rest deep and sing joy and just enough time in a day not to feel hounded, pressed, driven, or wild to get it all done — yesterday" (One Thousand Gifts, page 67).

This has really gotten me thinking. I want to live intentionally. I want each day to be purposeful. Not busy, not wasted, not aimless. I want to breathe deep and really see. I want the day to be full of my attention and not distracted by "more." More stuff, more work, more stress. I recently mentioned that I am giving up magazine subscriptions because they distract me. Some times I pass one on the kitchen counter or on the couch end table, and I think "I really need to read through that to get ideas on how to change my house." Now, there is nothing harmful in that. Creating beauty and having a hospitable home that you are proud to share with others is a blessing. But in our culture, we are constantly told that we need more. More is better. And every year, we literally buy into the lie that we need new clothes, more things for our house, a new car, etc. In 2010, the self-storage industry in the United States had a collective $20+ billion in annual revenues, and Wall Street analysts consider the industry to be “recession resistant” based on its performance since the economic recession of September, 2008. What are we storing that is so important? As Americans, we keep buying more things because we believe we have to have new things to be happy. Once we buy a new item, we feel guilty about replacing the "old" item, so we just end up storing it, telling ourselves that maybe we'll use it one day. Now I recognize that this isn't always the case, but you get where I am going with this. More, more, more. A lie that the Church needs to stop buying into. That I need to stop buying into.

"Giving thanks for one thousand things is ultimately an invitation to slow time down with weight of full attention" (p. 69). 

Slowing down. Living fully present. Giving thanks for the simple, everyday gifts that God blesses me with. Enjoying what I have and not believing that I need more. These are ways to slow time down. Jesus tells us to not worry about tomorrow (Matt 6:34). Stop fretting and start seeing things for what they are — just things. Seeing people for their value in God's estimation, stopping long enough to look directly in my daughter's eyes when I answer her question, and thanking God while I wash the dishes — these all slow time down. These all help to not live a distracted life. I usually wash the dishes fretting about the hundred other things that I need to get done. But what would it look like for me to sing, pray, and thank the One who gave me to food to make the dishes dirty? It seems so simple. And it's not as if I have never heard this before. But now, here in this place and time, it reaches my heart. By God's grace, I can see that "Haste makes waste. Life is not an emergency. Life is brief and fleeting but it is not an emergency" (page 73). Slowing down and not running about as if the world was coming to an end gives God glory. Having a quiet strength, a calm heart and an ability to live fully aware and in the present — allows room for praise to bubble up and for Joy to take hold. "Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she laughs at the time to come" (Proverbs 31:25). I want my life to be described as one who can laugh at what's to come and those are the type of clothes that I want to line the closet of my heart.


Are you reading along with me? What did you think of Chapter 4? What can you do to slow down?

~cheryl~


One Thousand Gifts Book Club
Part 1 
Part 2
Part 3

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