Slow Down!

Recently I’ve had the opportunity to travel a bit for work. Though I don’t enjoy traveling too much because I prefer to be home with family and friends, I did find an unexpected positive side effect. Traveling allowed me to slow down a little bit.

I’ve determined that each of us needs time to “slow down.” In today’s world we are literally wired 24 hours a day seven days a week. Our ability to slow down and relax has almost become nonexistent. And if you are like me, you have a hard time relaxing and slowing down when there is work to be done. (And does work ever really end?) But having long layovers and some even longer flights has almost forced me to slow down.

And slowing down did some wonderful things for me. It allowed me to re-evaluate how I am spending my time in life and wondering if the constant hustle and bustle I am always involved in is worthwhile. It allowed me to reflect and put back in to prospective what is really important in life and what is not. Finally, it allowed me to have a clear mind and think of new ideas to help me both in my work and personal life. In the end, slowing down added a lot of value to my life.

Unless we force ourselves to do so, we can be running around literally our entire existence only to look back and wonder what happened to our life. Too often we don’t slow down because we fail to recognize or believe the value it can bring to our life. Today I encourage all of us, including and especially even the busiest individuals out there, to find some time to slow down just for a bit. Take some time to think about what is most important to you and whether you are dedicating your time to that or not. I promise you that doing so will add value to your life.