Things change in summer. Bedtime hours vary. Schedules are more random. More books are read in a week than during a month of the school year. Even with our early rising for summer swim team, we don’t keep such an eye on bedtime because of the knowledge that a midday siesta is definitely a possibility. Life in general feels a little more spacious even when we are doing lots of things and seeing lots of people.

I think it’s partly the long hours of daylight that give us this spacious feeling. Or maybe it’s that we’re more in control of our unscheduled time because it doesn’t hold so much homework or so many meetings or fundraising obligations.

Maybe though it’s just an illusion. Which is fine with me, because illusion is part of reality anyway. And this illusion  should serve me once school starts back again in fall and I can take on this same spacious feeling.

I’m curious how others feel in the summer. I’m wondering whether this feeling is sort of universal or whether its a fabrication of my own mindset. Is it just that I relax more in these days? Or is there actually more time and space allotted? How does your summer feel? Does your family operate differently in the summer than during the school year?

Curiously yours,

Bernadette

We schedule just about everything in our lives. We schedule work. And exercise. And social time. And doctor’s appointments. And sports. And parties. And volunteer time too. Look at most any family calendar and you will see all sorts of activities, events, appointments and obligations.

Often though we are hesitant to create this same intention for family life. Or we schedule it but then if something else comes up we bump family time to the side as if it will just happen on its own.

But it doesn’t always. It needs the same intention and attention that we give most every other aspect of our lives.

I usually remember this. Most often we try to keep one day each weekend just for time with each other. But sometimes we forget. And we get back on the bandwagon of thinking that family time will just happen without any thought at all.

And then a little reminder comes in some form or fashion. And I am grateful to put it on the calendar again.

It seems each child of mine pops up in a whole new stage this time of year. Like a new part of their being is born, new skills are mastered, new ideas are formulated. It’s wild to watch them slide into the next and it’s inspiring too to those of us supposedly past all these developmental spurts.

Our three year old has just learned the art of drawing people. A circle. Two arms. Two legs. Two eyes. And, for him who is obsessed with ears, two of those as well.

The 7 year old has moved onto chapter books and a whole new world awaits her.

The 10 year old is speed skating down the alley in his new roller blades. Olympic dreams in his head.

The 12 year old is drawing like crazy, doing portraits in black and white. In a style we’ve never seen in her drawings before.

These new skills sometimes present in a troubled way at first.  As they work toward the newness, the shift, the big idea, they take a step back. They protest things a little bigger and a little more. They forget things they used to know.

Sometimes I remember that in the shifting comes the discomfort and the agony. But I don’t always. And I ask, “what the heck is wrong with them? Why are they acting this way? Why are they yelling/fighting/resisting/etc.?” And then the newness. And I smack myself on the forehead in recognition of the learning curve.

And me? I’m trying on this new hat of public speaking and loving it. Readings of essays. Story telling. Talks on parenting and slow family and any other topic that hits me close to home. It was a push to my edge at first. Now it’s a new love of mine.

I love spring and all the possibilities it presents. All the newness and the challenges to live our lives more fully as ourselves.

And I love when struggles have an explanation.

Our nugget of the week. Or month. Or random segment of time as the case may be…
Behold the Power of the Pause.

In our days, weeks, lives,
Whatever we see, hear, feel, read,
Allow it in.

And take a pause.

In the pause is the integration of all of life’s inspiration.

So, before you move on.
Before you react.
Before you continue to do, do, do…

Just be.

Allow the power of the pause.

If you’d like to sign up to receive our very randomly spaced Nuggets of Goodness send us an email and put NEWSLETTER in the heading.

We love TED talks. We especially love TED talks when they are about slow living. Check out our friend and inspiration Carl Honore, author of  In Praise of Slowness and Under Pressure: Rescuing our children from the cult of hyper parenting giving his TED talk.

Click here to view it.

Maybe one day we’ll give a TED talk…

Lisa Belkin has a parenting blog on the New York Times website. She did a post on Slow Parenting. Check it out!

Slow has become my barometer for family life. My husband says I say it to everyone, whether they understand the status or not as in, “No we just can’t do that this weekend, it’s not feeling slow.” He’s afraid someone might take it the wrong way, or get offended but really, it’s the only thing I’ve got to go on sometimes. It really has become one of my few completely reliable barometers. We RSVP to parties based on whether it will feel slow or not. We assess our weekend based on its slowness. We choose activities based on slowness. We chose our current school using this same measure because though we loved our other school, it was just too much time in the car which didn’t feel slow to me at all.

I’m not saying we’re always moving at a snail’s pace, not by any stretch, but using this slow barometer really does help me keep it sane and steady. And if things aren’t sane and steady, then I use the slow measure to figure out what feels crazy and if it’s temporary and it’s obligatory or if it is somehow serving us in some way, shape or form. It’s really working for me this measure of slowness and to have the word to apply to it all. I think it’s working for the whole family too, although admittedly sometimes my oldest wants to move through the world a little faster than I do. And sometimes we even let her drag us along on her speedy ride – but even she is grateful when we reign it all back in.

So I have a question for you. In your own life, do you ever use Slow as a barometer? I’m curious to know.

According to Slow Planet slow is…

“…not about doing everything at a snail’s pace; it’s about working, playing and living better by doing everything at the right speed.”

With this in mind we can see that what is slow can vary from person to person, family to family and even day to day.