The Search for Absolute Slow
[This is a guest post from Lynnette Rogers (a.k.a. the missus)]
I love the contrarian spirit of the slow movement. It runs so against the predominant grain of our culture. I think truly committed slow practitioners quickly see the benefits of slowing down – less stress, more enjoyment of life, better gas mileage. But I suggest that slow food, long baths, arriving early – these are aperitifs. True contrarians don’t stop there. They understand this is only the beginning, the peel, as it were, of the luscious fruit of absolute slow.
There is a hidden world of slow available only to the deeply committed. (By that I don’t mean institutionalized.) If you’re willing to risk more ridicule from your speedy friends and family, I suggest trying meditation. A warning: this should only be attempted by advanced practitioners. The most excellent benefits don’t begin to show up until after at least ten years of slow practice, if you’re lucky.
If you’ve spend any time watching the workings of your own mind, you’ve noticed the wild and fragmentary nature of thought. Add to this the shifting clouds of emotion you experience. Pile on the non-stop change in all your physical processes. In the face of this frenzied activity, it’s hard to make a case for a solid “you” in there. This, I suggest (and I’m not the first to do so), may be a primary cause of human suffering and discontent. It’s either this, or too much coffee.
Here’s where slow skills have much to offer. By sitting quietly, kicking into slow drive and just observing, we can discover some very cool stuff. There’s been much discussion over the years about what this might be, but with permission of the IINDM, I call it Absolute Slow. It’s possible to actually get relief for a little while from the tyranny of being oneself.
I’d be interested to know if anyone else has experienced your own version of Absolute Slow …
Ey oop, Chris, I think she’s after your job!
Very thoughtful & well-written piece, that, Chris’s missus (try & say that without pouting or having it all just merge into “Chrsssmssss”… or “Christmas”!)…
I particularly like the word “contrarian” & the idea of getting relief from “the tyranny of being oneself”… but I would suggest that the practice of meditation, in removing oneself from oneself, does in fact also facilitate the conjoining of oneself with the *deep core* (”pure,” unsullied, child-like) of oneself… ??
Either way you look at it, though, I would definitely agree that meditation enables one to see a self that one normally does not see – being obscured, as it is, by the blurring societal cumulous of caffeine and information overload… Perhaps coming to a position of pure, 100% stillness is as unattainable as the absolute zero of physical matter, but meditation can certainly be the means of attaining the slowest, deepest, most-still state of “Absolute Slow”…
A good night’s sleep is also good for this!
You’re such a beautiful writer…love the imagery of the peel of the fruit. I don’t meditate, but my husband is constantly nagging on my long showers. In every way we’re conservationists, but give me my hot water! That’s where my mind unwraps and allows exploration of seedlings of ideas that lay buried most of the day. The shower is the most profound place of existence, so much that most every day upon forcing myself out, the first thing I do is grab a notebook to write down all the amazing ideas I had inside.
For me, funnily enough, it’s dozing on a busy train… Don’t ask!!
Gretchen,
I am with you on the hot water. I think soaking in hot springs is absolute bliss. Take a look at these Japanese macaques in a hot spring.
Dan,
If you are dozing on a train, you might be going fast without knowing it. Dozing of course is a wonderful thing and you’re more likely to be chatting with your Muse in that state.
Fast on the outside, but slow on the inside…
Thanks, Dan and Gretchen, for your kind and amplifying comments on Absolute Slow. I’m with you on the showers and sleep - bliss for the taking!
However, I’m intrigued by the possibility of some foundational experience beyond even slow. In this I have company in Shakespeare’s musing:
“But thought’s the slave of life and life time’s fool; and time, that takes survey of all the world, must have a stop.”
I like the experiment to see how far slow will go.
Hi, I’m a reasonably regular meditator, in the tradition of Insight meditation (or Vipassana), and I can confirm that it can bring opportunities to discover some very cool stuff indeed! Just sitting and watching the mind, and the breath, and the body just doing its thing with minimal interference or direction from ‘me’, is a pretty profound experience sometimes. And sometimes it’s just hard work, and everything in me wants to rush off and be somewhere else doing something else. Which is also amazingly instructive… Long live slow, and adventures beyond slow! Beth