Moving At Your Own Pace

I think one of the important things to remember as we do our best to live our lives is that we can move at our own pace. There is, at least in North America, the tendency to believe that we must always be "doing" something. We can easily get caught up in our own or society's expectations of what we should be doing and how fast we should be doing it. Although our Inner Voice may be telling us to slow down or take a walk or be silent (or all three at the same time), we instead take on unnecessary tasks or move at an unnecessary pace. Even though our bodies and minds may be saying, "Slow down, you need some restorative time, some quiet time," we continue with our habits of endlessly tweeting or facebooking or texting or bringing our work home with us. Soon we find ourselves exhausted, depressed, anxious, edgy.
In my experience, as someone who is sensitive and is in the healing process after childhood and religious abuse, I know that there are days, when I'm not in therapy, that I need to lay on the couch and "do" absolutely nothing. Now that spring is finally here, I need to take long walks in nature, which will soothe my soul and mind more than any iPhone ever could.
Who cares if this is seen by some as being "unproductive" or even lazy. They clearly do not understand your heart and mind. As we learn to honour our own path to healing and wholeness, we will reinforce what we have known for a long time; that we need to learn how to "be" kind and loving to ourselves if we're ever going to be good at "doing" anything at all.
Mark Andrew Nouwen