An Ode to Slowness

I must be honest; I miss the slow times so often. I mean the times when it would take months or years to travel and go over a mountain.

These were the times when love was a patient art, expressed through handwritten letters carried by horseback, and the anticipation of a lover's visit was a silent, hopeful vigil that began with each sunrise.

This was the time when students in the schools of Magic would understand the necessity of decades of initiation and silence when learning ancient and mystical wisdom.

We would make the bread over many days of slow fermentation. To nourish our family, we had to grow our food and tend to our trees.

I long for those times of slow growth, learning, connection, and movement.

There is an intimacy and a soft love in slowness that any speed or technology cannot match—a gentle, soft breeze on the soul and the heart that our exhausted bodies crave.

Our modern lives may be filled with convenience and speed, but they lack the richness of silence and the depth of patience our ancestors knew so well.

It's all too quick, too loud, too intense, and too disorienting for our ancient ancestral bones.

I long for those moments when we could all feel each other because we would have had a lifetime of connection around the gentle tribal fire, building our houses with bare hands and soil, resting gently at night under the rotating stars.

I know you do, too. I have yet to meet a fast man filled with true joy, belonging, or any magic. It is sad. And it is tender to feel this loss we have created in our attempt to avoid our true feelings and escape the inevitable death.

We are lost snails in a terrifying horse race, and our shells are breaking down. But if we can slow down, we might hear the land's cries, mothers' anguish, and children's hunger. We might also hear a wiser, older voice often drowned out by our agitated minds.

I have been waking up with a deeper desire to slow down recently. Maybe it is because I am getting older and hopefully a little wiser. Maybe it's the wisdom of winter sipping into my bones. Or maybe it is because of my daughter's smile and soft eyes. She knows that this moment is precious, and if I don't slow down, I will miss what truly matters and suffer the greatest loss of all.

She knows what the Oak tree always knew, what the forest remembers, and even what the fragile roses constantly whisper: "There is no truth in hurry-ness or busy-ness."

It seems tender to acknowledge that the only truth worth knowing is when all time seems to stop, the heart skips a bit, and the breath appears held.

Now I remember that trees take half the year to rest, bears hibernate in the winter, walnut trees take many decades of slow growth to bear fruits, and not everything in nature needs to run on a capitalistic schedule.

Now, I am remembering that my becoming can only be slow.

Angell Deer

"An Ode to Slowness" extract from "Ancient Whispers Heard at Sundown," a book in slow, very slow, birthing, for when the time is right.

My first book, "The Sacred Web," is published worldwide. Available on Amazon here.

Coming up in 2025, "Becoming the Medicine" released is scheduled for late spring.