Slow Living Tips To Unhurry Your Life

I wanted to compile a list of slow living tips in order to help hurried mamas take a deep breath and begin to enjoy their lives again! You may not be able to do every thing listed, you may not even want to do it, but certainly if you choose a few to implement straight away, you’ll be on your way to a slow living.

How to start slow living

I’ve never been one for the fast paced life. I mean, I used to believe that I was. I had big dreams of becoming the next Carrie Bradshaw when I was finished with high school.

Me and the big apple never would have gotten along.

Way deep down inside of my soul, my Creator wired me to be of the slower paced sort.

Quiet evenings in.

Books, and blankets, and fireplaces, oh my!

So, even though I had my heart set on big time adventures, and dabbled in hustle manic endeavors, my soul won the battle.

I settled for the best life ever.

The slow, simple life of a homeschooling, homesteading, homemaker.

Because if I couldn’t be Carrie Bradshaw then I darn sure could be Caroline Ingalls, amIright?

Before you start your slow living journey, it’s important to self-assess. Know how you usually roll. Your slow living might be my busy week life. The best way to begin is by being realistic about who you are and how you are.

Is it really beneficial to live a slow life?

Here’s what I’ve gathered in my years of being a part of a community of hustle: some people thrive there and others are bogged down by the pace, but all of the people need a break.

We are created to need breaks.

Having been privy to the inner thoughts of some of the most successful influencers on my team, I can tell you, every person has an underlying level of stress, anxiety, and pretty extreme need for validation.

What I’m saying is, we would all benefit from slowing down. Even the ones who love the race.

We don’t all have to don aprons and knead our bread dough by candlelight, but who wouldn’t benefit from releasing themselves from the outside pressures of a society that is never going to be impressed by your efforts?

Slow Living Principles

From diets to SEO tactics, we all like having some guidelines for success. It’s so much easier to live in a way that allows you to check off your boxes and feel confident that you’re moving forward.

That doesn’t work for the slow living movement.

Instead, there are a few principles that will keep you on the right track, if not totally fixed rules that will guardrail your path to the slower life.

Slow living principle #1

Slowing down means not being in a race anymore. That means the comparison habit needs to go. Stop looking to the left of you, stop looking to the right of you. All that matters in your journey is your journey. Kapeesh?

Slow living principle #2

Living more slowly means un-scheduling. No longer can every block of time be filled in, in your awesome little planner that you just love to buy and waste every year, unless you are filling in those time slots with the words “Margin” or “Nothing”.

Slow living principle #3

Peace trumps productivity, but laziness is not a part of the slow living movement. It’s not about doing nothing. It’s not about sitting around and staring at the wall for two hours a day. Slow living is the art of carefully balancing your go with your be still.

It’s a matter of recognizing that guarding your peace, nourishing your soul, and strengthening your relationships through the dedication of your time and attention is a productive use of your time.

Slow Living Tips To Unhurry Your Life

Learn to enjoy your daily tasks. Resolve to embrace what cannot be avoided.

Embrace the weather. There’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing.

Cook from scratch. Nothing slows you down like having to hand select each one of your ingredients.

Guard the margins in your schedule. A margin is not free space to be filled. It’s filled by it’s free space. #soprofound

More tips for hurried moms

Simplify. Go old school traditional in some areas of your life, and see how patient you really are. Clothesline over dryer? Washing dishes by hand vs. using the dishwasher? I dare you.

Homeschool from a relaxed frame of mind. We tried co-op for a year and promptly decided against it. It is allowed, ya know. You can do all of your homeschooling at your home.

Homeschool instead of public school. No more frantic mornings, racing through all of the things in order to get to the bus stop only to have it be twenty minutes late. Pj’s until noon? Why not?

Limit extra-curriculars. Our kids will be involved in one extra commitment at a time. Not because they can’t handle more, but because I can’t. And refuse to. We’re also prolonging our eldest’s involvement in competitions, for awhile, so we can keep the pace of her equine lessons slow and simple.

Stay off social media as much as possible. It’s much easier to not keep up with the Joneses when you can’t see them.

Minimize electronics and news intake. There was a time when we didn’t know all of the awful that was happening in every country in the world. The awful was still there. It just didn’t increase our anxiety or deepen our depression. Notice your own little world, instead, it can be oh so good!

Journal. Pay attention to your thoughts, your feelings, and your inner life. These slow living tips won’t do any good if you’re not spending time observing their effects.

Leave your phone in another room more often. Like, as often as possible. Remember when phones were actually attached to the walls? With cords? And you had to leave them in another room? You don’t actually have to be reachable every second of every day.

And if possible, you definitely should implement these final two:

Expand your homestead. You can’t hurry nature and you can’t skip out on your responsibilities when those responsibilities include caring for living, breathing creatures. Slow living is hard to avoid on a farm!

Garden. Plants will only grow so much each day. And you might have the world’s best compost in your soil, but we all have to wait for fruit to ripen before we can pick it and enjoy it.

In a world of instant gratification and “sooner is better”, it would do you and your family a world of good to embrace these slow living tips! Which one will you do first?