The Art of Slowing Down: A Love Letter to Presence

Presence is found in the moments we least expect.

Not in the grand gestures or the major milestones, but in the soft, quiet places—the scent of freshly brewed coffee filling the kitchen, the way light dances across the walls as the sun moves, the feeling of warm water running over your hands as you wash the dishes.

For me, presence is in the mundane. It’s in romanticizing the smallest pleasures of life, in finding beauty where it would otherwise go unnoticed. And I believe that when we learn to honor these simple moments, presence expands into every corner of our lives.

Unlearning Urgency

There was a time when I lived under the weight of urgency. Rushing from one task to the next, feeling like everything had to get done now. I was caught in a cycle of stress—pushing myself to meet deadlines, letting my boundaries blur, feeling the temporary relief of completing something, only to be met with the next urgent task.

And then, I had to step back and ask: Is anything I’m doing really that urgent?

I’m not saving lives in an ER. I’m not handling a crisis that requires immediate action. The urgency I felt was one that I—along with society—had created. And once I saw that, I knew I had to let it go.

This realization hit me hardest before a two-week trip to Costa Rica with my (now) husband. I had pushed myself to exhaustion, scrambling to get everything done before we left. And then I had a moment of surrender: Whatever doesn’t get done before we leave will be here when we get back. And that’s okay.

Because nothing is truly urgent.

Of course, this is still something I have to remind myself of often. I think it’s something we all struggle with. But learning to release that pressure—to let go of the false sense of urgency—has allowed me to invite more flow into my life. More space to sit with things a little longer. More presence.

Why We Struggle to Be Present

I think presence is something that, on some level, we’re all craving. But it’s also something we struggle with—because the world doesn’t make it easy.

We are constantly moving. Constantly checking calendars, crossing things off to-do lists, looking ahead to the next thing. It’s no wonder we feel disconnected.

But when we allow ourselves to slow down, to stop rushing from one thing to the next, we create space for presence to unfold naturally. We allow ourselves to be rather than just do.

And that’s where the magic happens.

The Rituals That Bring Me Back

One of the biggest things that has shifted my relationship with time was cold plunging.

I’m not currently in the practice, but last year, I would get into freezing cold water for three minutes at a time. And something profound happens when you step into water that cold—you can’t focus on anything else.

The only thing that exists in those three minutes is the sensation of the water, the intensity of your breath, the pure aliveness of your body.

And what I learned is that when you are fully, truly focused on one thing, time slows down.

Those three minutes in cold water felt like forever. But if you compare that to three minutes of scrolling on your phone? That time disappears.

It made me realize how much of our time isn’t actually lived—how often we are somewhere else, mentally, instead of fully experiencing the moment we are in.

Since then, I’ve been more intentional about my micro-moments of presence.

• When my coffee is brewing, I don’t try to get something else done in those three minutes. I just stand there, breathing in the scent, letting time unfold slowly.

• When I feel overwhelmed, I move my body. I breathe deeply. I let the tension shift.

• When I need a reset, I take a shower. Water has a way of washing away the weight of the day—especially a cold shower, which shocks the body into full presence.

Presence doesn’t require a retreat, a day off, or some perfect moment of peace. It’s already here. It’s just a matter of choosing to be in it.

The Beauty of the In-Between

There’s something really beautiful about the middle.

We tend to look at life in extremes—happiness and sadness, love and grief, anger and contentment. But what I’ve come to realize is that the truth exists in the in-between.

Take grief, for example. It’s one of the emotions we fear the most, because we think that if we let ourselves feel it, we’ll never get out. But grief is just love with nowhere to go. We grieve because we love.

The same is true for anger—it exists because we have known deep contentment. And sadness? It wouldn’t hit as hard if we had never felt joy.

When we allow ourselves to sit in the in-between, to hold space for both ends of the spectrum, everything softens. We stop resisting our emotions. We stop fearing them.

And instead, we meet life as it is—fully present, fully awake, fully alive.