The Two Speeds of Life

Movement 01

The Years We Run

Have you ever noticed that life seems to come in seasons?

Not the seasons on a calendar. The seasons inside of us.

There are seasons when we run. And there are seasons when we crawl.

There are seasons when we are the rabbit. And there are seasons when we become the tortoise.

For most of my early adult life, I was the rabbit. And if I'm being honest, I think most of us start there.

When we're young, everything is new. Everything is exciting. Every opportunity feels like it could change our lives forever.

We sprint toward experiences. We sprint toward success. We sprint toward relationships. We sprint toward whatever shiny thing catches our eye.

Life feels like one giant audition.

We're building a resume for college. Then we're building a resume for our first job. Then we're building a resume for our next promotion.

Then we're trying to build the perfect relationship. The perfect family. The perfect life.

And while we're running, there's very little time to stop and ask ourselves a simple question: Why am I chasing this?

Instead, we just keep running.

We chase the things we were told matter. Money. Career. Status. The big house. The nice car. The expensive vacation. The corner office. The five-star resort.

And we rarely stop long enough to ask whether those things are actually ours... or whether they were handed to us by our parents, our friends, our culture, or the media.

The rabbit doesn't have much time to ask questions. The rabbit only knows how to run.

And for a while, that works.

In fact, I think the rabbit phase is necessary. It's how we experience life. It's how we learn. It's how we gather stories.

But eventually... life has a way of slowing every rabbit down.

Movement 02

When Life Stops Us

Sometimes it happens gently. Sometimes violently.

A health scare. A divorce. The loss of a job. The death of someone we love. Depression. Failure. Heartbreak.

Sooner or later, life delivers something that stops us in our tracks.

And in that moment, something extraordinary can happen.

What feels like destruction... may actually be an invitation.

An invitation to put on a different pair of lenses.

My first experience with this came many years ago.

Within a matter of months, my business went bankrupt. My marriage ended. I had to leave a place I thought I loved.

I felt embarrassed. Humiliated. Lost.

I had worked so hard to build what I thought was my future. And suddenly... it was gone.

Every plan I had. Every assumption I had. Every expectation I had. Gone.

Movement 03

When Running Was No Longer an Option

I remember feeling as though someone had knocked the wind out of me.

I was scared. Angry. Confused. But mostly... I was numb.

And for the first time in my life, I couldn't create a plan.

I couldn't hustle my way out of it. I couldn't work harder. I couldn't outsmart it.

I simply didn't have the energy.

Life had reduced me to a single task: Just survive today. Then survive tomorrow. Then survive the next day.

And that's when something unexpected happened.

Life forced me to become the tortoise.

Movement 04

Coffee at Four in the Morning

I moved in with my grandmother. She had suffered a stroke and was bedridden.

I eventually took a job bartending, mostly to get out of the house and bring a little structure back into my life.

I'd work late into the night. Then I'd come home in the early morning hours.

And around three or four o'clock in the morning, my grandmother and I developed a ritual.

I would help her out of bed. We'd make coffee. And we'd sit together in the kitchen. In the dark. Watching squirrels.

If you had told twenty-five-year-old me that one of the most meaningful experiences of my life would involve drinking coffee at four in the morning and watching squirrels... I would have laughed at you.

But life has a funny sense of humor.

My grandmother knew every squirrel. Seriously. Every single one.

She would point them out and tell me about their personalities.

"This one is greedy."

"That one is shy."

"This one always comes first."

"This one waits for everyone else."

She had been watching them for so long that they had become part of her world.

And slowly... they became part of mine.

Movement 05

What I Could Finally See

Those mornings changed me.

Not because of the squirrels. Not because of the coffee.

But because for the first time in my life... I wasn't chasing anything.

I wasn't trying to become someone. I wasn't trying to prove anything. I wasn't trying to get somewhere else.

I was simply present.

And that's when I discovered something:

Slow isn't the opposite of success. Slow is the doorway to awareness.

When you're running at rabbit speed, you see targets. When you're moving at tortoise speed, you see life.

You notice people. You notice beauty. You notice pain. You notice yourself.

And sometimes you begin noticing the things you've been carrying for years without ever really examining them.

The grief. The fear. The insecurity. The expectations. The stories you've inherited from other people.

Movement 06

Standing in the Rubble

Most people think grief is about losing someone. But grief is bigger than that.

Grief can happen whenever a version of our life dies. A marriage. A career. A dream. A belief. An identity.

And eventually, after the denial, anger, bargaining and depression, we arrive somewhere different. Acceptance.

But I've come to believe that acceptance isn't the finish line. It's the starting line.

Acceptance is where the rebuilding begins.

It's where you stand in the rubble of your old life and begin asking:

What stays? What goes? What was actually mine? What was somebody else's dream for me?

What do I want to carry into the next chapter? What do I leave behind forever?

That's one of the gifts hidden inside grief. It gives us permission to rebuild.

Movement 07

The Gift I Couldn't See Yet

Nobody wants the event that causes grief.

Nobody volunteers for bankruptcy. Nobody volunteers for divorce. Nobody volunteers for loss.

But sometimes the very thing that breaks our old lens... allows us to see clearly for the first time.

Looking back now, I can say something that would have sounded crazy to me then.

That season became one of the most meaningful periods of my life.

Not because it was easy. Not because it wasn't painful. But because it was real.

For the first time, I wasn't living according to somebody else's definition of success.

I wasn't chasing what the media told me to chase. I wasn't trying to impress anyone.

I was simply learning how to be.

And there is something profoundly beautiful about that.

Movement 08

The Two Speeds of Life

I've gone through several of these grief journeys in my life.

Each one arrived disguised as a crisis. Each one forced me to change lenses.

Each one slowed me down long enough to see something I couldn't see before.

And each time, I've come away with a deeper understanding of what matters.

Relationships matter. Presence matters. Shared moments matter. Connection matters. Love matters.

Everything else is negotiable.

Maybe you're in your rabbit season right now.

Life is moving fast. You're chasing goals and building dreams.

Run hard. Experience life. Collect your stories.

But every once in a while, slow down long enough to ask: Am I chasing what I truly want?

And maybe you're in a tortoise season.

Maybe life has knocked the wind out of you. Maybe you're standing in the rubble of a chapter that just ended.

The destruction may not be the story. It may be the beginning of the story.

Sometimes life slows us down so we can finally see. So we can finally listen. So we can finally discover who we are underneath all the noise.

Movement 09

What Really Matters

The rabbit gathers experiences. The tortoise gathers wisdom.

And perhaps the secret to a meaningful life isn't choosing one or the other.

Perhaps it's knowing when it's time to run...

and when it's time to sit in a dark kitchen at four o'clock in the morning...

drinking coffee with your grandmother...

watching squirrels...

and discovering what really matters.