SpaRitual's Slow Beauty Origin
Philosophy.
Slow Beauty® is all about creating moments within each day, week, month, season and year to practice the kind of meaningful well-being that make us glow. When practiced over time, these small rituals lead to manifest results - not only feeling healthier and more joyful, but in realizing true beauty and timeless aging. Slow Beauty® works because it’s a way of life and not a quick fix, and meant to be sustainable offering nourishment, sustenance and regeneration for you, your relationships and mother earth. A sustainable Slow Beauty practice is about creating deep and meaningful moments in your daily life so that depth, meaning and purpose become who you are and how you live. To make that possible we need to shift our attention to process, and the discipline of being in process, instead of placing our attention on quick fixes and instant results, and the pursuit of perfectionism.
Origin.
A satori moment by Shel Pink.
In April 2009, my son’s class pet, Torti the tortoise, came to stay at our house for a few weeks. At that point in time I, like so many others, was just being immersed in the world of smartphones and social media, and the constant connection that comes with that. It felt like everything was moving so fast and going nonstop in a perpetual state of busyness. And then there was Torti. Mesmerized, I would lose time watching him move about with his slow, calm and deliberate walk. It seemed almost as though he was in a constant state of meditation. He existed fully within each moment and was happy simply to walk, one intentional step at a time. It was beautiful to witness. In Native American medicine, tortoises appropriately represent mindfulness and patience. Torti certainly reminded me of how important those two things are. I had a revelation during the course of those two weeks with Torti, or what is known as a satori moment in the Zen tradition. As I watched this ancient creature move slowly but purposefully about, I realized in that moment of solidarity with Torti, I finally had a name for what I’d been practicing all along and understood how to bring it into the world: Slow Beauty®.
Thesis.
Who doesn’t feel fragmented in today’s fast world? We are perpetually in a state of constant distraction, and interruption by external impulses, some identifiable, knowable and anticipated, many unconscious and insidious. Layers upon layers of to-do, to have, to be, and a bold forgetfulness of how to prioritize the experiences we value most, those which ultimately bring us face to face with the moments of meaning we longingly seek.
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This guidance away from 24/7 linear “staying” towards experiences of covenantal “living” we so desperately need isn’t dogmatic (you have a voice in what this will become), hierarchical (not a top down approach – this is ultimately and most importantly about collaboration), or ideological (this isn’t a prescribed set of beliefs – we are forming something iterative and always evolving). This is a fluid, emotive, and illuminating touch leading us compassionately towards the actualization of a nourishing, poetic and sustainable creative richness– every day. From this heightened state of awareness we discover the inter-inclusion of a powerful and transformative equation: Strength (emotional, mental, physical) plus loving-kindness equals beauty – slow, enlightened beauty.
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This Slow Beauty® movement champions a long awaited and deeply needed communion – with self, in relationship with others and with nature. This movement is a journey towards wholeness in direct response to a lifestyle that has become too fast.
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The Slow Beauty® movement is the antithesis of the fast-paced world of the beauty industry that sells us quick fixes, immediate results and invasive options. This outdated perspective has us racing against time, and fighting against aging. The Slow Beauty® philosophy, a balance between expansiveness and restriction - a middle way, explores the big ideas of growing young, the spiritualization of beauty, and a renewed feminism, reframing our ideas and ideals about beauty.
Originally published as Slow Beauty Manifesto April 2015
