To Be Slow Like Mr. Shuff: Two Baby Steps and One Big Step

Decades ago, when I worked in the Men’s Department at a local department store, I remember being impressed at the unvarying pace of the unflappable Mr. Shuff.

Regardless of how busy we were or how impatient customers were, Mr. Shuff had one speed: slow. I never saw him stride purposefully, and I certainly never saw him scurry. Mr. Shuff always shuffled from one place to another.

He was no sluggard, mind you. He moved with purpose, and he was competent and focused.

But he never hurried. He simply refused to let other people’s urgency accelerate his pace.

I realize now what I so admired about Mr. Shuff: his internal processer operated at a different speed – a slower, healthier speed.

And that’s how I want to emulate Mr. Shuff. I want to slow down on the inside.

What does this have to do with discipleship?

Here I quote my journal (and fair warning: as I articulate my inner thoughts, it will sound irreverent, but it is what I was thinking as I wrote):

I’m still stumped on the “abiding” so many Christians talk about. I realize that when I read John 15 [Jesus’ teaching on “abide in me”] there’s a part of me that is tapping its foot impatiently. “Get to the point already, Jesus,” I say to myself. “What exactly do you want me to do? Just tell me so I can get on with it.”

Or, as C.S. Lewis put it once: “Inner silence is for our race a difficult achievement. There is a chattering part of the mind which continues, until it is corrected, to chatter on even in the holiest places.”

How do slow down my inward processor and silence my chattering self?

No easy formula here, because I got into this state by cultivating bad habits over decades. But there are two small, specific steps I have decided to take now.

I mentioned in a previous post that I’m reading John Mark Comer’s Relentless Elimination of Hurry. His chapter titled “Slow” has twenty specific suggestions. Two caught my eye:

1.       Deleting social media apps from my phone: I’ve noticed that the pace of scrolling through a social media feed is far quicker than the pace of reading. I can scroll mindlessly, but I cannot read mindlessly. I took Comer’s advice. I have deleted social media apps from my phone. I still have access to social media on my iPad, but not on the device I have with me at all times. If I want to kill a few minutes on my phone, it’s playing Scrabble or reading a book on my Kindle app or reading an article from my news feed – all activities that engage me at a slower, more thoughtful pace.

2.       Observing the speed limit: This one surprised me, but as I contemplated what Comer had to say, I realized that I often exceed the speed limit even when I don’t need to. Why am I in a hurry if I’m not late? This new commitment to observing the speed limit isn’t about conscience or my testimony as a Christian or fear of getting a ticket (though all of that matters). Nor is this a hard and fast rule (sometimes I am running late). This is about disciplining myself to slow down, both outwardly and inwardly. And I’ve discovered that easing up on the accelerator somehow has a calming effect on my mind.

I am not exhorting readers to delete apps or watch their speed more closely. I’m only reporting on what I’m trying to do. Obviously, there’s a lot more to slowing down my interior speed than refraining from social media and observing the speed limit. A lot more. But these two baby steps are a start.

One big step

There’s another spiritual discipline I’d like to explore that may help me slow down.

Although it sounds like a radical new idea, it is actually an ancient Christian practice: the discipline of silence and solitude. It is radical in its simplicity, being silent and alone with God for an extended period of time.

I recently heard someone recount a time he spent a day in solitude with God. He said it was sometime between the fourth and fifth hour he felt something shift in his spirit. It took that long for his mind to slow down and become clear so he could think and pray without distraction.

A whole day in quiet solitude? Even four or five hours is, of course, inconceivable for speed-addicted me. Solitude is what prisons use to punish recalcitrant inmates, and I’m supposed to go into solitude on purpose?

This is a discipline I intend to explore. I’ll report later.

In the meantime, I want to do whatever it takes to learn how to slow down, to recalibrate my inner clock so that I can walk with Jesus at His pace, not mine.

Persevere, Paul Pyle Pastor of Discipleship