slowing down

I've been so busy this month, I haven't slowed down long enough to write anything. I usually try to use my journal at least once a week to get my thoughts on paper, and I've learned that this practice can be very spiritual and helpful for my racing mind.

And so, when I read the prayer my boss wrote today (she writes and shares a prayer every work day with the staff & volunteers via email), I could feel it speaking to me. Not just because she mentioned a prayer request of mine, but because what she says about often doing several tasks at once and not being fully present in any of them, really struck me.

I have not slowed down lately; I have been going non-stop, trying to do more than possible and do it all faster than possible. This morning when I got to work early, I couldn't even focus enough to take advantage of the extra time I had. My mind could not slow down. It's was if I no longer knew how to function unless I was running late or feeling behind.

In actuality, I have lots of time right now. I'm at a place in life where I work 32 hours a week and have much more free time than when I was a full-time student or than I will when I have a full-time job. Yes, I do need to find a job for post-YAV August and yes I do need to study for the rec therapy certification exam I'll be taking in October, but those are not the things that have caused me to sprint through these last few days and weeks. It's just the little stuff I've allowed to cause me anxiety and keep me frantic.

However, as often happens, the guests I meet and work with at the outreach center are the ones who force me to slow down. I always have and will enjoy working with people. I love the challenge of relating to all sorts of people. I am passion about people and motivated by people. Today was a great example of this truth.

A woman named Christopher talked to me for at least an hour, probably longer. We discussed homelessness, how tough it is, how cruelly others treat those who are homeless; we held hands and prayed together; we cried together and agreed that being female is not often easy; we laughed together and laughed at each other.

Much like other guests of mine who seem as if they may never stop talking, Christopher would not get up out of her chair and leave my desk, she just kept bringing up things to talk about and telling me how much my thoughtful, caring, friendly nature meant to her. She told me countless times that in the two days she had spent being homeless, I was the most genuine person she had met. I also took her to be pretty genuine, so her words were powerful; they spoke to my heart.

And although I thought about asking her to leave so I could assist other people, I just couldn't. It didn't seem like the right thing to do. Even though it goes against society's idea of productivity, I felt like there was a reason it was so hard to get her to leave. Perhaps it was a way to get me to slow down, to not be so "productive" in the common sense and instead, force me to be fully present in the moment and the task at hand, even if the task at hand was talking with Christopher about how much menstrual cramps hurt, but how they make us as women stronger.

Here is the prayer Kimberly, my boss, wrote this afternoon:

Feast or famine … a common phrase that we all may hear or say from time to time … This phrase can be used to describe the Outreach Center sometimes … there are days when we are bursting at the seams with guests and there are other days when hardly anyone is sitting in our lobby by late morning. Yesterday was one of those days … it felt like a famine, but today was a feast! The lobby was packed from the time we opened until we closed! It was busy and no matter who you were or what you were doing, you remained busy! There didn’t seem to be any time to slow down!

As I sit here and reflect on all of that, I keep going back to something Katie shared with us during our circle. She wanted us to think about “slowing down.” She was on her way to work this morning, when a man in her neighborhood said, “Coffee?” She thought he was asking her if she had any coffee. She said she gave him her standard answer, “I don’t have any cash” and she kept walking. She said she later realized that he was sitting in front of a convenience store and that possibly, he was just asking her to go in and buy him a cup of coffee. She said she could have done that with a debit card, but she was busy, headed in her own direction, and didn’t slow down. She said it was a good reminder to her and she wanted us to think about it.

God, I have thought about it this morning, a good bit of the morning in fact. I felt at times that I was trying to do three and four things at a time and I realized that I wasn’t doing any of them very well. I am often like this and I wonder if anyone else operates the same way?

God, help us to remember to slow down. Who knows what or whom we may encounter if we do? Amen.