Power of Slow

Change has been on my mind lately. It may have something to do with the book I am currently reading by Chip and Dan Heath, Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard.

In my mind, change is always hard. It’s uncomfortable and messy and rather inconvenient. It requires relinquishing control and becoming accepting and patient and…you see where I am going with this?

For years I thought we had a limited capacity to learn certain things, such as cooking or economics. That we have propensities that lean toward the arts (me) or the sciences (um, lots of other people who are not me). But I have since learned that we are capable of anything, if we try.

As a young adult, I had not yet experienced the delight of food, for instance. I remember even saying once that eating was a waste of time and I’d be just as happy taking a food capsule over sitting at the table for a full-blown meal.

Such a typical, pre-Slow idea – why waste time eating when you could be doing something — anything — else.

Only we have to eat to live.

That truth whizzed right over my head, like a buzz cut.

Looking back on my 21-year-old self, I am shocked that I ever thought that way. One of my favorite pastimes now is to sit for hours and eat! I entered a new culture of fun food fantasy, but it wasn’t until very recently that I discovered my own ability to cook, bake and whip up a delicious meal whenever my fancy strikes.

A lot of our resistance to change, according to Switch, has to do with our self-understanding. We have an image of how and who we are and, if we have a fixed mindset that states we can’t really change much about ourselves, we get stuck. When we entertain a growth mindset, we open the floodgates of possibility.

Bake a batch of cinnamon rolls? Who, me?

Yeah, me.

This morning. Just because.

Tapping into our inner divinity is a nifty thing — it unleashes us from the confines of our limiting beliefs. Once a culinary philistine, I am now a kitchen goddess.

It feels good to move beyond who we think we are to the person we are meant to be.

Change might be hard, but think of the alternative. Getting a few stretch marks for a better life seems like a very good trade to me.