The other day I was at my friend’s office when the book Vom natürlichen Umgang mit der Zeit by Friederun Pleterski and Renate Habinger caught my eye. The title translates as “How to Have a Natural Relationship with Time”. Astonished that someone else thought the way I do about time, I devoured the book on our car ride to the Alps in one sitting.

The most notable chapter is about awakening the senses through Nature. As we sped toward the mountains, I took the opportunity between chapters to soak up the landscape. Then, as we rode the cable car to the mountain’s apex, I breathed in the fresh air, noted the ever-changing vegetation, and the coolness surrounding us.

Our four-hour family hike took us eight hours to complete. Somewhere along the way, in all our wonder (and in our children’s eagerness to hike quickly), we took the wrong path. It was a great lesson in the power of slow ~ the faster we went, the more lost we became. Seven hours into it, we finally found the right path. Too much of a good thing can also be detrimental to one’s well-being. Our senses were beyond awakened  ~ they were on steroids with eyes bulging!

In all truth I get my best ideas in Nature, but another important point in the power of slow is realizing what your best pace is. After traveling about the country for a week on tour with a book author friend of mine (post forthcoming), I was looking forward to a steady, yet painless meandering through the forest. Instead we embarked on an odyssey of epic proportions. The sagest lesson learned? Even as we get lost and things take a wrong turn, the best you can do is put one foot in front of the other. Eventually, you will find our reward. In our case, it was a banana split!