slow going

from  http://notsalmon.com/2012/09/04/cha-cha-your-way-to-happy-life-cha-cha-changes/#.UEjfeI1lRcQ 

While I was running this morning, I was thinking about how slow I run.  I'm usually a 12+ minute miler. When I first started running, I just liked running, period, and wanted to stay running the whole time, instead of taking walk breaks.  Now that I can pretty much keep running most all the time, I am starting to get it in my head that I should be going faster.  It doesn't really help that many of the running blogs I read feature ladies who are sub-9-minute milers. Good for them! I mean that without a hint of sarcasm. BUT, for me, I need to keep that comparison out of my head, because it is not helpful AT ALL!

I have never really been a patient person, and I see now that the progressive improvement in running that I thought was keeping my impatience at bay isn't even progressive enough (in terms of speed, anyway) to keep me satisfied!

So...I will have to relax and adjust. And I love the graphic above (by the way, the whole notsalmon.com website is freaking amazing) and the message that is brings.  I also love the poem below, which a good friend just shared with me yesterday. As I was running this morning and thinking about my slowness, I remembered the poem and had a brief, and fleeting, a-ha moment, thinking about the ways that the message to be okay with the slowness is trying to permeate my life.  So maybe I just need to chill out and let it permeate.

Above All,
Trust in the Slow Work of God



Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
     to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way
     to something unknown, 
         something new.
Yet it is the law of all progress that is made
     by passing through some stages of instability
         and that may take a very long time.



And so I think it is with you.
Your ideas mature gradually. Let them grow.
Let them shape themselves without undue haste.
Do not try to force them on 
     as though you could be today what time
         -- that is to say, grace --
     and circumstances 
        acting on your own good will 
     will make you tomorrow.
Only God could say what this new Spirit
     gradually forming in you will be.



Give our Lord the benefit of believing 
     that his hand is leading you,
     and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
         in suspense and incomplete.
Above all, trust in the slow work of God,
     our loving vine-dresser.


Amen.
~Pierre Teilhard de Chardin