Slow Down and Start Small
Greg McKeown in his book, Essentialism, says, "'Everyday progress—even a small win' can make all the difference...The key is to start small, encourage progress, and celebrate small wins....Done is better than perfect."[1]
Starting small is difficult. Small takes time, and we don’t have time. We push for the thing that will get everyone’s attention because we can’t wait. We need to create something big, and we need to do it now. It is too important to wait for the small wins.
While Greg McKeown is not writing to a religious audience, I see myself in these words. I think—The message of Jesus is too important. I need to do something. And it needs to be done now—actually, it should have been done yesterday.
And maybe you see yourself in these words, too?
While we have an impulse for the big thing, small wins make all the difference
I was reminded of this in a recent conversation when someone said, “There are a lot of terrible things that are happening in the world, but what we are doing here matters. It may not be huge giant shifts right away, but we are doing a lot of small things.”
It is the small things that transform the world—small acts of grace, love, and hope. When we wait for the one huge thing that may make a large splash, we miss all the small rays of light and hope that have passed by us.
Luke Edwards (no relation) writes in his book, Becoming Church, “Churches are notorious for starting a ministry without asking if the community wants or needs it.”[2]
We often start without asking because it takes less time. We want to love people and offer hope to our community, but we want to do this quickly and immediately. Our American mindset leads us to do it now and listen to others later.
The American way often clashes with the way of Jesus. Where our culture says to push harder and faster, Jesus calls us to slow down.
We need to pump the brakes and take a deep breath—in and out.
Luke Edwards explains that he listened to his community for three months before taking their first step in creating this new ministry.[3]
Pump the brakes and take a deep breath—in and out.
What is one small thing that you can do today?
If you think, This is so small, I don’t even know if it is worth it?
Start there.
Spiritual Disciples like, prayer, fasting, solitude, silence, worship—among many others, connect us more deeply to Jesus. They are not something we do once or twice, and suddenly have some spiritual experience.
The point of spiritual disciplines is not to produce an experience. Instead, it is to pump the brakes—to pause—to pull over on the side of the road while all the other cars are zooming past to simply refocus on Jesus.
It is as small as taking 5 minutes to pray—or even 60 seconds.
This connects us more deeply to the way of Jesus, which is slow, small, repeated actions of love.
[1] Greg McKeown, Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less (Currency, 2020), 196 & 199.
[2] Luke Edwards, Becoming Church: A Trail Guide for Starting Fresh Expressions (Fresh Expressions, 2021), 50.
[3] Ibid, 55.