In college, I had a nickname.
The Mission.
It had nothing to do with my Christian faith and everything to do with how quickly I moved across campus. Regularly, I darted back and forth between my classes. I raced into the library and then would study with my right leg constantly bouncing under the table like I was already moving toward the next thing. Meals, too, I frequently inhaled in just a few minutes so that I could be off to the next thing.
Constantly, I was on mission.
I look back at my college self, shake my head, and say to that kid:
Slow down, Bobby!
Enjoy a few more conversations.
Worry a little less about the next grade.
And goodness, look up at the trees you’re racing by.
Sometimes my friends would laugh about my ridiculous pace - which was good. I needed something to reign me in. But also, it only worked a little. I didn’t actually know how to stop the pace at a fundamental level because speed was always a symptom of something much deeper: the feeling that I was not smart enough. Worthy enough. Good enough.
My unconscious reasoned…
If I go fast enough, far enough, and long enough…
I’ll be worthy, right?
I’ll belong, right?
I’ll arrive, right?
And my legs took the cue and hurried along. All the time.
—
The other day I was trying to get our two young boys out of the house for a few errands we had to run.1 I also had hopes for arriving back home in time to do a few household chores before dinner, and so I moved naturally into my Mission Pace.
“Boys, shoes on!” I shouted down the hall toward the room where they were playing.
I heard giggles and some playful wrestling but nothing that sounded like movement toward shoes.
“Boys!” And now my voice was getting louder, making clear the urgency. Nothing.
“Leo. And. Logan!” which I said in the kind of slow voice that is actually meant to make things go super fast. ASAP.
“Time to get on your shoes!” I yelled one more time.
And just as I turned the corner to add my insistent presence to my insistent voice, I saw a shoe go flying across the room.
“No!” my oldest cried.
“We’re playing,” he then added as both of them remained seated on the floor, insistent on their lack of motion.
It took a few more minutes and a small bribe to bring about the shoe procurement and the exit from the house I had hoped would happen far sooner. Poor parenting, disgruntled children, and unremarkable errands - quite a Saturday we had underway.
And honestly, I should have learned by now. Our boys do not move quickly. Sure, they love to run around, but when it comes to a general pace in life, I calculate their speed at 100% unhurried.
Which means the second I bring Mission Pace into the room, they resist.
Every. Single. Time.
It’s not premeditated on their part but more like my friends from college who laughed at my Mission Pace. My boys just shake it off as ridiculous.
Here, we’ll show you fast. Here’s a shoe across the room. And now we’re going to go back to our no-shoes-on pace.
And, of course. Because kids get it. They are naturally unhurried.2
So long as they have a loving environment (not always a given, I know), they do not spend their energy trying to prove their worth and their hours hustling-unto-acceptability. In fact, accomplishing more, sooner, and faster is just strange.
Why not enjoy playing and see where the fun, focus, and connection take things? feels like how children respond to the pace of modern life that presses for constant speed.
In short, children know nothing of the Mission Pace. They actively resist it because what is natural for them is the Moment Pace. A pace deeply at home with being in the moment of life they are given.
You can see it when they bring an immersed focus to their play with dolls, Legos, or an outdoor mud kitchen.
You can feel it in the snuggle that isn’t looking to go anywhere else anytime soon.
You can hear it in the way they repeat words from the bedtime story, never looking to ‘knock out’ a page goal but instead diving into the full meaning of the current page.
—
If you had asked college Bobby what he wanted to be when he grew up, he likely would have named a bunch of extrinsic hopes and goals - certain jobs, titles, or recognitions. And a Mission Pace would carry him faithfully, he assumed.
Current Bobby - after a few crash-and-burns from going too fast for too long and having children like prophets who keep calling him to the truth?
I am much more fascinated by the intrinsic goals (which, it turns out, fuel the most powerful extrinsic possibilities, too). In fact, I’ve come to believe that for many the hardest thing in the world, and therefore perhaps the greatest and most sublime accomplishment of all is a fundamentally intrinsic thing;
Namely, to love yourself.3
Not in some arrogant, narcissistic way (which is really shame-based fear and self-hatred, at root).
Rather, to love yourself in the following sense:
You no longer give credence to the racing, internal chatter that declares so routinely how you are not good enough and or worthy enough, and you screwed up again and won’t get it right next time either.
You no longer spend your days anxiously racing on a treadmill to nowhere stacking up accomplishments and titles that are never (nearly) enough.
Instead…
You bask in a profound sense of self-acceptance and love for all that you’ve been, all that you are, and all that you will be.
You show up regularly with the kind of courage that is willing to try and fail at anything because your sense of self-worth is not tied to success/failure metrics or what others will think about the outcome.
You’ve learned to love others not from a place of need (I have value because you need me!) but instead from a place of genuine love. Love your neighbor as yourself, right?4
This particular work can and often does take nothing short of a lifetime.
Fortunately, children everywhere are throwing shoes across the room to remind us of this work. And if we’ll heed their toss and join them on the floor, we will discover that the space of play is one of the very best ways to leave the Mission Pace and enter the Moment Pace - and grow in the best way possible.
What other ways would you name? Are there certain activities, people, or places that are really great at moving you from Mission Pace to Moment Pace?
Certain things that have a way of drawing you from…
Frenzied to focused?
Frantic to fun?
Fearful to full?
Judging to generous?
It’s an important consideration because… do you know what is one of the most significant signs that you are growing in your love of self (and therefore a genuine, generous love of others)?
When you are living less frequently in Mission Pace and more frequently in Moment Pace.5
Put another way, it’s when you are increasingly showing up to the world grounded, playful, hopeful, curious, courageous, and kind - for these are the fruit of a Moment Pace saturated in love.6
—
By the way, that room where my oldest threw the shoe? It’s the playroom where they regularly build these creative Lego structures and huge magnet tile cities. All of it is done amid a lot of laughter, wrestling, and connection time.
The Mission Pace may look more promising at first, but it’s the Moment Pace that builds what matters.
Ever notice how we run errands? Our language makes clear that the collective, largely unconscious assumption for how we go about the daily checklist is at the pace of fast.
True, our boys can get very impatient when they are hungry or tired - like most any child. But once the basics are taken care of, the sense of hurry disappears.
Three quotes that underscore this central point:
“The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.” - Carl Jung
“To love ourselves and support each other in the process of becoming real is perhaps the greatest single act of daring greatly.” - Brene Brown
“Self-respect is the wildest adventure we'll ever take in our whole lives… I don't think you can truly change for the better in a lasting, meaningful way unless it is driven by self-acceptance.” - Brene Brown
The Robcast has a great podcast episode on the topic of the as yourself part of that equation.
“Love and hurry are fundamentally incompatible. Love always takes time, and time is the one thing hurried people don't have.” - John Ortberg
I have long marveled that Jesus’s first act of public ministry is not world-changing healing or preaching but his own baptism - during which God declares him, “my beloved.” Belovedness is the first, foundational, and fueling truth for the whole thing.
Hey Bobby,
I love the Be in the moment it is a present.
Thank you,
Suzy
We all go through this phase, and it seems that we need to be very young, or getting older to achieve it. Gift from God I would say.