December 2024 Week 3

As synchronicity would have it, I ordered a book while I was away last month called - Slowing Down to The Speed Of Joy. I just really liked the title! Of course I ordered this before I knew what would be waiting for me on my return from my trip in terms of my health and the patience I would need. This book has also been helpful during this busy holiday season when our energy and focus is spread out to many places and people. Pausing and slowing down allows us to not miss the joys all around us. In one section of the book the author writes:
Urgent, busy and hurry are often in control of our lives.
We are always in a rush.
We live hurried lives.
We are a stressful presence. We bring chaos to the rooms we enter.
We are not present to the one person before us.
We give only half hearted attention to the person before us in the moment.
We give only a portion of ourselves to anything.
If we are eating a meal with family or friends, we are preoccupied with our plans tomorrow or something that happened earlier in the day.
If we are talking to someone we are looking over their shoulder to see who else is there.
We are always somewhere other than the now.
We are always hustling as fast as we can to get from one place to the next.
We are living our lives at an insane pace.
We do everything half heartedly
We have no sense of how much activity is enough for a single day.

Ok for me… guilty, guilty and guilty again to many of these lol. This is not how I want to experience the next couple of weeks.

How about we pause (what a pleasure!) and sit quietly with these questions before the holidays and set the intention to pause with pleasure and slow down to the speed of joy!!

Have a very Merry Christmas or a Happy Hanukah or whatever it is you celebrate!!