As I take a sip of the fresh source water filtered into my cabin, nestled at the edge of an ancient forest, my eyes settle on the inscription on my bottle: “It is okay to be slow”, with a little illustration of a snail for good measure. This water bottle was a gift from my closest friend, a reminder that no matter what is swirling inside or outside of us, it’s okay to slow down.
The source from which I’m drinking springs from further up the land and runs into a stream along the tree line, down towards my cabin. This whole area would have been ancient forest, now with a field to the right and a pine plantation further over. The stream runs into a small river beside me, mighty after rainfall, and always gentle and calming. A constant friend.
In the years we lived near each other, my closest friend gave me permission, over and over again, to slow down. What he was really teaching me was to be more gentle with myself. He saw clearly and put words to how much I was doing, particularly in the subtle realms, in any room, at the supermarket till, and at healing circles. He named something I couldn’t yet see for myself: how much energy I was constantly exerting. This became a big learning, and an even bigger practice.
He wasn’t simply encouraging me to do less. He was teaching me something about how to love myself at a deeper level.
One of the first principles of relational work is slowing down, pausing in conflict, giving rise to better understanding and communication with our loved ones. What if we were to slow down in relationship with ourselves? With our inner parts, our inner children? What if we were to slow down and listen enough to learn a new way of relating, first with ourselves?
Some of us grow in healthy, expressive environments, with attuned parents and others who teach us a healthy way to relate to ourselves and the world around us. Some of us grow up learning a relational language that is unhealthy, even abusive. As adults, we can find ourselves looking for those who speak the same relational language that we recognise, perhaps because it is the language we have known for so long. It takes so much courage to leave that old relational language behind and learn something new.
When we learn a new language, particularly as adults, we need to slow way down. We repeat words and phrases in our own minds and sometimes ask those around us to slow down so we can understand. A new language can feel clunky in this way. And this is how it can feel internally when we start to approach ourselves in a new gentle way.
Slowing right down in breathwork, going gently and gaining the trust of our bodies and wounded inner parts, can open us up to a new and healthier communication, and ultimately to the open flow of love within that was our birthright.
And yet, slowing down and being gentle in breathwork can feel wildly frustrating. There can be deep resistance to slowing down enough to truly see and be with ourselves, and the parts of us who may not have been seen for years, even decades. Parts that have successfully hidden, or been hidden, in bluster and overdrive.
Giving ourselves permission, or receiving permission from another, be that a trusted friend or a practitioner, can give us access to our own love for ourselves.
As with the cycles in nature and our bodies, without rest during winter, there would be no spring or summer. So much of what matters happens in the hidden and invisible realms.
Clients often reflect that the permission and encouragement to slow down and be gentle is profoundly healing. I too have felt profoundly moved, and slightly armoured, around being given permission to go slowly and gently. As if I still don’t quite believe I deserve it.
This makes me wonder how many of us have learned to relate to ourselves through urgency.
I look down at the words on my bottle and think of my friend, and all the times he gave me permission to slow down. I realise that perhaps this was one of the greatest gifts he gave me, not permission to do less, but permission to meet myself differently, a gateway into deeper love.
Outside, the stream continues to journey through the trees. She moves around stones, gathers after the rain, becomes mighty and then gentle again. There is no sense that she is behind.
Perhaps our healing can be like this too. There are seasons of movement and seasons of stillness, moments when everything seems to be happening and moments when the work is quieter, hidden beneath the surface.
It’s okay to be slow.
Harriet Harmer – AIR soon to be graduate
