" There is a secret link between slowness and memory, between speed and oblivion, " says Milan Kundera in his book " La Lentezza " (1995). In fact, if we stopped to think about our best memories, we would realize that most of them coincide with the moments of life marked by calm and serenity : a summer evening with friends, a holiday, a Sunday in family, a candlelight dinner.
On the contrary, we tend not to remember with pleasure - or not to remember at all - the moments in which we are obliged to run without stopping, or periods of stress.
Despite this, our society seems to have taken a direction that takes us further away from a slow and serene lifestyle.
Obsessed with competitiveness, efficiency and productivity, many people appear to be " hyperactive" : they continue to work once they return home, they consider idleness a waste of time and in general they are deeply stressed.
Let's see what are the proposals aimed at reversing this trend and at finding the right rhythm to combine health, wellness, work and social life.
The praise of slowness
Leading, being among the fastest and most aggressive seem to be the keys to business and social success, but there are things that need to be done slowly and, if they are done at an accelerated rate, they pay the price in terms of health and happiness.
The obsession to do more and more in less time has become an addiction, in a sort of idolatry that is making us lose good habits with respect to food, work, family, social and even sexual life.
These are some of the ideas expressed in 2004 by Canadian journalist and writer Carl Honorè in his bestseller " Praise of slowness " (" In Praise of Slow: How to Worldwide Movements is Challenging the Cult of Speed " in the original version).
The author's proposal is an invitation to counterbalance the excesses of "turbocapitalism" by slowing down the pace of activities and, above all, by consciously changing direction: not being afraid of inactivity .
Ten years after the publication of this book, the Italian neurobiologist Lamberto Maffei, former director of the CNR Institute of Neuroscience, writes an essay of the same title. It is a further " Praise of slowness " (2014) which reflects on the possible consequences of the passage from a slow thought to a rapid thought induced by the frenetic dynamics of the new millennium.
The publication of two texts with the same title is significant and can be read as a sign of a certain existential, philosophical and social unease towards a historical period dominated by the intrusion of emails, notifications and reminders even in the moments dedicated to leisure time .
Creative idleness, tips for doing nothing
The disease of the time: the relationship between frenzy and health
Also in the medical field there is a reflection on the relationship between time perception, frenetic life rhythms and health. According to US doctor Larry Dossey, obsession with time can profoundly affect our health, contributing to the spread of one of the leading causes of death, heart disease.
In one of his books, " Space, Time and Medicine ", Dossey calls the disease of the time the belief that you do not have enough time and that you have to "pedal" faster and faster to keep the pace set by the short time to layout.
The diseases and disorders caused by frenetic rhythms are numerous, including anxiety, insomnia, depression, hypertension, obesity, gastrointestinal, dermatological and cardiac problems, up to the extreme case of death.
Karoshi: a dramatic reality to think about
Mita Diran, a 24-year-old Indonesian girl worked for an advertising agency doing overtime every day. Almost always he came home at dawn to go to work again soon after. One day, in 2013, he writes on Twitter that he worked 30 consecutive hours and after a few hours he dies of a heart attack.
The history of Mita is linked to that of other thousands of people from the reality known as "Karoshi", a Japanese term that can be translated as death due to overwork . Many cases of death by overworking have also been recognized in other Asian and European countries. In China, where this phenomenon is called " guolaosi ", a report presented by the Chinese Communist Youth League reported estimates for more than 600, 000 people died a year from work-related stress . Cases have also been recorded in Europe, the best known of which concerns a 21-year-old boy who died after 72 hours of uninterrupted work in the London branch of the Merrill Lynch bank.
Given this reality in countries where production levels have led people to support work patterns that exceed human possibilities with dramatic health consequences, we should turn our eyes to our society and our life, reflect on the path we are taking and to ask ourselves if we are not also approaching this dangerous threshold.
We could start thinking about small things, asking ourselves if, for example, smartphones that are always on and connected - instead of simplifying our lives - they were not leading us towards a lifestyle with ever more unnatural rhythms, interrupting our idle moments and progressively limiting the time that we dedicate to healthy activities for the body and mind.
Rediscovering the benefits of slowness can be the key to a healthier life that respects our limits as human beings.
