Your Quiet Craving for Change Is the Beginning of a New Way to Live

When I started writing this blog, I was writing to my younger self — the mom with the small children, the woman who was still finding her way in the world. I was speaking to the individual who was trying to always be all things to all people. I was having a chat with an exhausted younger me.

“Sometimes, when the spinach wilts before I’ve had a chance to sauté it, and the washing machine growls like it’s possessed, I remember the dream. The one I had while stirring oats at sunrise, with my small children playing around my feet. A quieter, handmade life. A less noisy existence, allowing for more margin. That dream isn’t naive. It’s sacred, and it’s knocking again.”

There’s something strange that happens in the space between dinner dishes and bedtime.
The time of the day that reminds me that another day has passed, and there was good as well as bad woven into the fibre of our existence.
A kind of ache. Not loud or dramatic, yet persistent.

I often notice it as a flicker of resistance when I scan the to-do list I wrote last night.
Or as a twinge of envy when I see someone on social media harvesting pears or drying wildflowers — and I wonder:
How did they pull that off? How did they get a life that doesn’t just swallow them whole?

I notice that when you look at glimpses of my life on social media, it looks like it should be “fine.”
And yet, there’s a subtle recoil from the pace, from the pressure, from the performance of it all.

This blog is for that moment.
For that whisper in your chest that says: “There must be another way.”

Not a fantasy, nor an escape plan.
But something… truer. Something more rhythmic than reactive, that can hold both laundry and meaning.

Welcome to the beginning of Slowsteading.
But not the kind you think you know.

Not the Off-Grid Fantasy

Let’s clear something up:
Slowsteading isn’t the aesthetic of enamel pots and upcycled pantries.
It isn’t about quitting your job, moving to the Karoo, and becoming a goat whisperer.
It isn’t rustic minimalism or rebellion in gingham. It’s not a life swap.

It’s a deep internal rerouting —
a redrawing of the lines that define what enough is,
a daily, sometimes hourly, reorientation around peace.

And here’s the thing:
You can begin it right here —
in a townhouse with cracked tiles,
or waiting in the traffic queue,
in a life full of schedules and commitments.

Slowsteading is not a destination;
it’s a decision to relate to your life differently.

When You Start Saying No

We tend to automatically accept societal expectations as our personal goals:

• Attend every sports game
• Be involved in school events
• Say yes to every invitation

Extroverts might thrive in that world.

But for someone like me — someone who feels depleted by draining social contact — it’s been crucial to get honest.
Honest with myself.
And honest with my children.

They can still participate.
But I had to define what my involvement would look like.

To be emotionally healthy, I need time to refill my own tank.
That means giving energy to activities that nourish me.

It’s the only way I can show up as:

• A present parent
• An intentional partner
• A steady, grounded human

This kind of clarity takes time.
It requires a mature honesty.

Pushing harder in the wrong direction won’t get you closer to peace.
It’ll just get you further from yourself.

The Tension Is the Invitation

We all experience emotional drain differently.

To identify when that happens, you have to stop silencing your inner voice.
That tiredness you keep brushing aside?
That’s not weakness — it’s wisdom.

Boredom, numbness, and the endless hustle to keep up are not signs that you’re broken.
They’re signals.
Signals that your values are whispering: “We’re not in sync.”

What if we stopped medicating or overcoming those signals?
What if we listened?

Because when your outer life no longer matches your inner longings, you’ve hit fertile ground.
No, it doesn’t feel good.

It feels like:

• Irritability
• Procrastination
• Overwhelm

But it’s not the end.
It’s the threshold.

The Threshold Nobody Talks About

Slowsteading doesn’t start in the pantry.
It doesn’t start in the garden.

It starts here, on the edge of the life you’ve outgrown.

This is a strange place.
You haven’t left the old rhythms,
but you can’t keep living them in good faith either.

You’ve seen the cost.
And now, you’re restless with it.

This is where you begin.

• Not by adding more
• Not by quitting everything

But by standing in the tension and asking yourself:
“What am I unwilling to continue pretending is working?”

It’s not glamorous.
But it quietly rearranges everything.

An Unexpected Way In: Trace Your Contradictions

Try this — not as a solution, but as an unveiling.

Make a list: What I Say vs. What I Do

Write down 10 things you believe or value.
Then write down the actual habits that relate to those values.

Examples:

• I value calm mornings → I check email before I get out of bed
• I believe in nourishing meals → I eat standing up over the sink
• I want to be present with my children → I multitask while they speak

This isn’t about guilt. It’s about clarity.

You’re not weak.
You’re just misaligned.

And misalignment can become a compass, if you let it.

That’s the invitation today:
Not to fix your life, but to face it with honesty.
To notice where your actions and longings are in quiet contradiction.
Because that’s where the gold is.

Before the Blueprints, the Bare Truth

Planning comes later.
Projects come later.

First, we pause.

We notice the ache — instead of explaining it away.
We let ourselves want what we want — without apology.

This part of the journey isn’t about solving your life.
It’s about returning to it.

Feeling the pulse beneath the pavement.
Letting go of the urgency to optimize.

When you stop trying to escape your life — and start listening to it — that’s when it begins to open.

A Quiet Dare

You don’t need a garden to slowstead.
You don’t need a bread starter.
Or the right linen apron.

You need just one thing:

A willingness to stop numbing the ache and let it point you home.

This week, I dare you to do one thing:

Sit with a cup of something warm —
tea, broth, or coffee gone cold —
and write this at the top of a page:

“If I stopped holding it all together, what would fall apart — and what might finally come alive?”

No edits.
No judgment.
Just write.

This is the true beginning.
Not with a bang — but with a breath.

I end my note to my younger self with this:

Be careful not to confuse social pressure with personal purpose.
The one leads to destruction.
The other leads to destiny.