Just like many in our day and age, I don’t read a lot. I struggle to find the time. I sidetrack and forget the details of the text I only read seconds ago. Yet the superficiality of my focus still provides me with some intangible peace of mind. Something I now think I can associate to the meanderings of thought in a slowed down pace.

More precisely, I have the impression that the relatively slow flow of reading enables my mind to wander and heal some of my most invasive thoughts. Just like when you dream about things that are imperceptible yet worrying, leading to a resolution.

This is to be compared to the alternative environment that our digital age provides us. The instant gratification, no break flow of information seemingly falling down on you at every second. Very little time to wander off, leading to more repressed thoughts and feelings that sometimes lack an escape route.

That’s probably why a lot of people find refuge in an extreme sports diet. It’s another setting in which the mind can slowly catch up while the brain is not under aggressive stimulation. But if sports enable some of the repressed organizational thought processes to occur, reading enriches them and triggers certain connections that likely can only appear under a calm and serene setting that manifests in a relaxed, low physical effort activity.

Writing is another process that seemingly sparks this feeling in a similar way. In particular, writing by hand at a slower pace than the typing I’m doing right now. Writing by hand enables the thoughts to form more organically before the writing completes. I would even dare to argue that the quality of philosophy and reflections of the past are partly a result of their respective mediums. But also of the time and dedication that we were willing to devote to such actions in the first place.