Eight Questions and Answers about Slow Living
Three years ago, I published a book about slow living in Danish. Since then, I’ve gotten a long list of questions about the topic. There is no doubt that no matter how much I believe in the value of slowing down the pace of one’s life, slow living is in many ways simply put a reaction. A reaction to our time’s dominant tendencies, which dictate more effectivity, more measurable and visible results, more materialism more busyness. Slow living is fundamentally different from these tendencies, which basically are all about us wanting more of everything.
Over the last few years, I’ve met a lot of people who’ve said they wanted to live a slower life and didn’t want more but rather less. Fewer emails, fewer meetings, less busyness, less stress. In the next sentence though the same people often say that it just isn’t possible. The hamster wheel keeps turning, rent has to be paid, children have to be picked up at school, and thoughts about slow living remain foreign and far away, an ideal, something many people don’t think is realistic.
My point is that slow living IS actually a realistic possibility. We can’t live a slow life at any cost, but if we are willing to prioritize things differently and accept that with slow living we get something but also lose something, we CAN live a slow life. Below I’ve made a list of some of the most common questions about whether slow living really is realistic in today’s Denmark or the United States, anno 2023, and tried to answer them as best I can. I hope my answers will help you to decide whether slow living is something for you.
Photo credit: Emilie Haut
1) What is Slow living really?
Slow living is first and foremost a lifestyle. It is a lifestyle, where you prioritize doing things well instead of doing them quickly. Quality is more important than quantity, and intimacy and engagement are prioritized over quick and easy solutions. As I wrote in more detail in an earlier article, the modern, international slow movement grew out of the slow food movement, which started in Italy in the 1980s. From there slow living has taken many forms, but no matter what form it has taken, living slowly means we are in closer contact with nature and with our own humanity.
2) How do you get started with slow living?
There are a lot of different ways to get started, but generally it’s a good idea to prioritize one area of life at a time. For example, you could start by deciding to go for a walk outside every day, read a good book for a half hour every evening, begin to make food from scratch without readymade products, or simply agree that you and your family will turn off your phones and other electronic devices when you eat together. Once you’ve included one slow habit in your daily life and felt its positive effect you will want to start including slow living in other areas of your life.
Another way to start is to ask this question:
What is most important to you?
Think seriously about it and write your answer down. It will motivate you to start trying to live slowly.
3) Does slow living mean you have to quit your job?
The short answer is no. Quitting your job – as I did in 2014 – is of course a very effective way of slowing your pace, but it is absolutely not necessary. I still work—writing, giving talks, teaching freelance. I’m not planning to change that. For me it’s more about how I work and live, about being mindful and aware of the choices I make.
Admittedly, if you are career driven and work 80 hours a week, it’s harder to live slowly, but maybe a little less can still do it? Can you consider cutting back on work hours? Talk with your boss about working from home one day a week or something else, anything which can give you more breathing space? There are 168 hours in a week, and in Denmark most of us work 37 hours a week, which gives us 131 hours where we don’t work. Maybe you could start by living slowly in just some of those 131 hours?
4) Is slow living and simple living the same?
The two terms are related, and you can say that slow living and simple living share the same values. However, they aren’t quite the same. Simple living is more about materialism and about saying no to it. It’s more about our possessions and about simplifying them rather than adding more to them. Simple living matters but slow living is more a philosophy, a lifestyle, and an approach to life. One can say that simple living is a way to live out this philosophy, but it’s not the only way. You can definitely live slowly and still have a home which is full of knickknacks. Such a home doesn’t have that much to do with simple living though.
5) Is slow living only for the wealthy?
Sure, everything is easier when you have lots of money in the bank, but it isn’t a requirement for living slowly. Quite the opposite, if we make a lot of money, our wants and our expenses often go sky high, so we end up running even faster in order to pay all our bills. Slow living is a way out of that unfortunate circle because we end up recognizing that having money and material goods are not necessarily the same as feeling happy and content.
6) Can slow living even fit with modern family life?
Maybe you can turn that question around? Modern family life can be busy, and many families with children have trouble making their everyday lives hang together This leads to stress. Therefore, wouldn’t it be a good idea for families to slow the pace of their busy lives’ down, live more slowly and have more time for each other and for the children? Slow living is definitely suited to families, but, of course, it requires that there are some things a family must choose to do without. It means recognizing that you don’t have to do everything just because you think you must or should.
7) How about if slow living is for me but not my partner?
Good question! What do you do when you are slow and your partner is fast? The best thing of course is to talk openly and honestly about things and to focus on the positive things that happen, if one partner chooses to slow down in one way or another. My own wife, Kirstine, unlike me hasn’t quit her job. She likes it, and she works a lot, but we go on slow trips together and we see slow living as a joint project. The fact that I have chosen to live slowly means that I am home in the afternoon with our children and can have dinner ready when Kirstine comes home. It’s a positive thing, that we all benefit from slow living, and we can talk to each other about it. Ask each other: what are the positive effects of our living at different speeds in some parts of our lives? How can we best help each other? How does it make us stronger as a couple? It helps to have a common ground, which is mutually beneficial.
8) I have heard about slow food and slow travel, but is there more to slow living than just that?
Yes, absolutely. There are slow cities, slow parenting, slow work, and even slow sex. Slow living is a general way of life, and its principles can be transferred to virtually all areas of life. Start where it makes the most sense for you.