The Quiet Side

Exploring the unseen benefits of creative focus.

Slow Down :  moving, flowing, or proceeding without speed or at less than usual speed

Slow down is advice often given, but is difficult to actually do.  In this episode of Quiet Side, rather than spending a lot of time reading about why you should slow down, I wanted to offer a simple exercise to be done almost anywhere with just a paper and pen.

Need more practice? Our podcast TanglePod has several epsisodes about the benefits of slowing down, Breathing Life into Creativity and our premium episode Connect the Dots both have some additional exercises to help you spend some time with slowing down and focus.

Try This

Pick up your pen and draw a line. If you have a tile, wonderful, if you have a sketch pad or notebook, use that.  If all you have handy is a note pad with your grocery list – flip that over and draw a line.  Perhaps you have a string in place, or a border so go from one side of the string to the other. If your paper is blank, simply draw a line. It doesn’t have to be a long line, maybe three or four inches.

Now a little distance from that line, draw another line parallel to the first. But draw this line at half the speed as the first one. That is right, slow it down. Maybe you need to count. One, two, three for the first line. Count to six for the second line. Take a nice deep breath.

Now you have two lines, add a third. And draw this one half as fast as the second. Yup, slow it down even more. Take a breath before you get started, and take another breath when you are finished.  Got the drill? Repeat this exercise each time slowing your line down. Taking a breath. Relax – there is no rush, there is no competition, and there is no goal.

Out of space? Rotate your paper and draw more lines, in the same fashion perpendicular to the others. You continue to do the exact same stroke and the rotation makes a grid. By rotating your paper you can just continue melting into the exercise, relaxing your mind, remembering to breathe and slowing down.

This is a gentle exercise to help center your breath and help you focus – repeat as often as necessary.

deliberate – still – appreciate – quiet – focus – trust – deconstruct – beautiful – reflect – relax – discover – create – comfort – shade – breathe – inspire – be bold – embellish – savor – slow – calm – admire

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