The Gift of Being Unhurried

What might we discover if we simply slowed down?

In a world that constantly encourages us to do more, move faster, and fill every available moment, practicing unhurried time can feel surprisingly difficult.

In this episode of the Leadership Vision Podcast, I chatted with Dr. Linda and Brian Schubring, and together we discussed how intentionally slowing down can help us become more present, deepen our relationships, and notice what we might otherwise miss. We talked about how doing this, can become a gift to ourselves, and a real opportunity to connect with others.

We shared personal stories about leadership, parenting, and everyday life, and talked a lot about how sometimes the most meaningful thing we can do is stop rushing long enough to pay attention.

“The more hurried we become, the more blurry the landscape becomes.” — Brian Schubring

Three Takeaways to Practice

Here are my three biggest takeaways from talking with Linda and Brian

1. Interrupt your normal pace.

Being unhurried doesn’t necessarily mean doing less. It means deliberately creating moments when you’re not racing to the next thing. Try slowing your speech, putting away your phone, or allowing a conversation to unfold without worrying about what’s next.

2. Ask yourself, “What am I noticing?”

Brian reminds us that the faster we move, the blurrier our surroundings become. Take a moment to step back from your daily responsibilities and notice what’s happening around you, within your team, and within yourself. What might you be overlooking?

3. Prioritize presence over productivity.

Whether you’re leading a team, spending time with family, or simply enjoying a moment alone, resist the urge to make every minute productive. Sometimes the most valuable thing you can offer is your undivided attention.

What might become clearer in your life or leadership if you gave yourself permission to slow down?

Transcript

Below is the full transcript from our conversation, with only minor edits for accuracy.

Nathan Freeburg: Linda, Laura and I are editing your newsletter. it’s this new thing that we’re doing. We’re publishing some kinda quick thoughts on what the two of you are just reflecting on and reading and listening to and, and all that. And I am not a reader of poetry. I’ve tried a couple times. I just don’t get it.

Dr. Linda Schubring: No, but you get comedy, so it’s

Nathan Freeburg: which is, is similar, but yes. But your reflection, what you’re seeing is the gift of being unhurried,

Dr. Linda Schubring: Oof,

Nathan Freeburg: So you wrote, “Perhaps the invitation isn’t always to do more, move faster, or find the next answer. Sometimes it’s simply to be present enough to recognize what is already before us.” So to start today’s podcast, I want you to, maybe just reflect on that, and then we can kinda go in backwards a little bit to this whole idea of being unhurried.

Dr. Linda Schubring: in the past several months, I think it’s so easy to be caught up in being hurried, rushed, onto the next thing, doing 12 things at once, trying to respond to an email, and there was a commitment that I made to myself at the beginning of the summer, and that was, “Linda, can you find some ways to practice unhurried time?”

And it was a concept I learned, many years ago, and unhurried time means a calm, relaxed, and deliberate pace of life that avoids rushing, often practiced as a spiritual discipline or mindful habit. And for me, being unhurried or practicing unhurried time involves me sitting on my hands sometimes.

involves me, you know, trying to settle the monkey mind, and be in a place where I don’t have to rush, I don’t have to respond to every, every phone call or email. And, this summer I met with another CEO, and we, we spent an afternoon together, and we both put our phones down, and we just talked.

And the whole time I was either, like, wanting to, you know, write something down or say something. I kept repeating to myself just, “Linda, practice unhurried time.” And the both of us, when we stood up, after three hours of chatting and just enjoying being outside in the summer in Minnesota, we both had a slew of emails and, you know, phone calls and texts and, “Where are you?” and, “What’s happening?” But the gift of unhurried time gave me pause to appreciate the relationship that I was building with my new friend. pause and reflect on the things that might be important, and where I wasn’t trying to synthesize everything that she was saying or, have a, you know, quick response.

The unhurried time allowed me to slow down. I think there’s a, tendency that I’ll have when I listen to podcasts to listen to it at 1.3 or 1.5, and I think unhurried time is, like 0.8. And unhurried time, it invites a counterculture, anti-consumerism approach that I think is good for our souls. So that’s why I wanted to, to talk about it. Brian, what are your reflections on unhurried time?

“And it was a concept I learned, many years ago, and unhurried time means a calm, relaxed, and deliberate pace of life that avoids rushing, often practiced as a spiritual discipline or mindful habit. And for me, being unhurried or practicing unhurried time involves me sitting on my hands sometimes.” ~ Dr. Linda Schubring

Brian Schubring: Well, my initial reflection on unhurried time is for unhurried time to happen, we have to disrupt what has become our natural pace and tempo of how fast we live life. Whatever speed that is, it’s a disruption of that speed, ’cause I think I know some people who live their life at 0.8. So even for them- Yep… there is a disruption of that pace so that they can be in an unhurried state. That’s my first response, is our willingness to disrupt our pace because psychologically we have somehow have grown to believe that a certain pace of living our lives is what is efficient and effective for us to find meaning and belonging and significance. So when we even entertain the idea of unhurried time, that means we are threatening our normal pace of how we navigate life, and that is in itself disruptive.

Nathan Freeburg: Hmm

Dr. Linda Schubring: When we were in Berlin and Brian is running the Berlin Marathon, he comes flying down way ahead of schedule and he’s having so much fun. He is enjoying the fast pace of the other, you know, runners and he said, “I have to slow down. I have to slow down.” And so he was saying out loud-

Brian Schubring: Yep…

Dr. Linda Schubring: I’m like, “You’re already running my full-on sprint pace, so I, I don’t know how to… If you tell me to slow down, I just walk.” So, so even in that, I think an invitation to be unhurried for you. So let yourself be, you know, be the standard and then what is, what is a bit of slowness or what is a bit of pause?

Nathan Freeburg: two thoughts I have running around my head. The first one, I’ve, I mentioned this in a previous podcast, but I, I spent almost a week, I was in the hospital, but I was with a family member who… I wasn’t the patient, I should say. And I was like, “Oh, we’re just gonna be sitting around. I’m gonna do all this. You know, we have a couple website pages we need to redesign. I’m gonna read books. I’m gonna, like, get all this stuff done.” and by the second day, it became very apparent that my job was to just sit there and be unhurried and do what needed to be done.

I got antsy and a little anxious ’cause I’m not good at that, right? I’m not good at, like, just sitting there. And so even, like, the doctors would come in and talk to us, and the cardiac rehab person, and I, like, recorded it, uploaded it to our podcast software so that I could get the transcript, and then, like, use AI to summarize. And I just, like, I had to be doing something productive because sitting there and being present felt like I wasn’t doing whatever job I thought I was supposed to be doing.

So how do you, Brian, Linda, when you’re working with leaders, or, or just high-achieving people that always feel like we gotta be doing something to, like, I don’t know, prove our worth or earn our keep, how do you, drill this message into them that it is, in your words, Linda, the invitation is just to slow down and simply be present is enough?

Dr. Linda Schubring: one of the things that I do is sometimes I will even slow the pace of my speech.

Nathan Freeburg: You just talk a lot slower

Dr. Linda Schubring: Well, and I will watch sometimes leaders like, “Well, what do you…” Yeah, faster.

Nathan Freeburg: right, right. Yep

Dr. Linda Schubring: And so inviting them to slow down a bit,

Nathan Freeburg: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Linda Schubring: or leaving space or interrupting them when they wanna just fill every, every nook and cranny of the space that I have, I have provided.

Nathan Freeburg: Hmm.

Dr. Linda Schubring:

Brian Schubring: one additional way, to get to an unhurried state is to distract from the hurry. because when we focus on what’s in a hurry or when we focus on being at a quicker pace, that is what gets our attention. So if we do interrupt that, and take away the hurry, I think we see things differently. We may notice, different things around us and within us that are asking for our attention that we were not giving our attention to because we were in such a hurried state.

“…when we focus on what’s in a hurry or when we focus on being at a quicker pace, that is what gets our attention. So if we do interrupt that, and take away the hurry, I think we see things differently.” ~ Brian Schubring

first of all, how we show up invites a sense of disruption of that unhurried state. Like when Linda talks about talking at a, a different pace, that is certainly true. how it is that I sit in the chair is also, an indication or hopefully someone will respond to how relaxed I am or how upright I’m, I’m sitting.

And we also ask a pretty simple question in the beginning of our sessions, and that is, “What are you noticing?” Yeah. And that question of what are you noticing is kind of this pause to ask people to look around. Hmm. to then name what’s getting their attention, and then we’ll always ask why. That tends to get into, “Well, who’s getting your attention?”

Like, what, what are you spending your time on? And I don’t know if you get a clear view on what’s getting your attention if you’re in a hurried state. So I will oftentimes say to someone, “Let’s just take a, a deep breath, lean back, and let’s look out over the organization. Let’s kind of look at the horizon or get in a helicopter and get above the campus and look down. What gets your attention?” And just like that metaphor of leaning back or rising up to change someone’s mental perspective, that disrupts the hurry to get them to a point of looking around and noticing what is actually getting their attention. The more hurried we become, the more blurry the landscape is.

Nathan Freeburg: The more, say that again.

Brian Schubring: The more hurried we become, the more blurry the landscape becomes. Agreed. as we slow down, the passing landscape gains more clarity. And when we stop, that’s when our surroundings become the most clear.

Nathan Freeburg: Interesting

Dr. Linda Schubring: So it is a practice of paying attention to the slow things or our inner landscape. part of the things that I was writing about is that I, I, I wonder- Mm… if the true poets that are putting words to our experience will be the ones that will lead us. And poetry that’s complex actually, like we, you have no choice but to sit with it. You have no choice but to wonder how those words were put together or what they actually mean. I think there are so many words that are put out there that are flashes and you’ve, reshare them and you repost and, you know exactly what it means, but it’s the deeper kind of poetry that will invite us to look at our interior in, in a different way.

“…it is a practice of paying attention to the slow things or our inner landscape.” ~ Dr. Linda Schubring

This summer I also picked up a book called The Book of Alchemy, written by Suleika, who is, Jon Batiste’s wife, and she has this collection of beautiful thoughts and words. And one of her practices that she invites people to think about is, because it’s, what’s the subtitle? A Creative Practice for an Inspired Life.

One of the practices is something called 10 Images. And so after, at the end of the day, you name 10 images that you saw or experienced in the day, and then you put some words around it. And I try to practice that on a weekly basis since this summer, and it’s funny and interesting to me that the 10 things that come clear, because it’s maybe one that I found on a walk and another one I found on a drive and another one in conversation or another, looking at something or artwork in our house in a different way or a different perspective.

And anything that we can do to interrupt the fast pace and practice slowness is almost an anti-venom to the doomscrolling and the screaming voices of society trying to pull you in one direction or the other. And so I, I have, I have just sought to consume poetry and allow the poetry to help slow me, slow me down.

Nathan Freeburg: Interesting. you guys always make me think of so many different things, but

Dr. Linda Schubring: So good

Nathan Freeburg: every year I have a reading goal. Like I wanna read this many books. And this year I set a really ambitious goal, and I found myself almost reading to just hit this goal instead of like actually, like, enjoying the books that I’m reading. And so I’m gonna do it totally different next year.

Dr. Linda Schubring: How’s that working for you? Yeah

Brian Schubring: Are you gonna win though?

Nathan Freeburg: Yes. Well, see, exactly. So it’s like I wanna read good things, but if I’m just like cruising through it to get through it, it’s sort of missing the point. there’s an, an author, Ryan Holiday, who I love. He writes about stoicism. When he had kids, he kinda started this sub-brand, we’ll call it, called “The Daily Dad,” which has kinda blown up.um… Every day it’s like a daily kind of parenting tip, more so about like, And it’s called “The Daily Dad” ’cause he’s a dad, but it’s for parents everywhere. I just wanna read you this part ’cause it is perfectly what you were talking about. and I related so much to it because I think my hurried pace in, you know, achieving more and doing more as a, as a leader also comes into as a parent too.

So he wrote, “Your job is not to set land speed records. Your job is to be their parent. Your job is to be present. Your job is to build trust and connection and have fun together.” And so this next part I think could be advice for all of us, regardless of if you’re parents, if you’re leading a huge company or not.

So his advice to do that is, “To dawdle, to linger, slow down, let it take as long as it takes. Stop rushing them. Slow down. Be present. Do your real job.” And I was like I was– He also has this in podcast form, and I was literally listening to this on my way back from dropping them at school, ’cause I gotta cram in a bunch of stuff, and I was like, “Oh my gosh, that was our morning. Let’s go. Lunches, shoes, ba-da, ba-da.” And certainly there’s some of that that you have to, you know, be doing, whether you’re a parent, whether you’re a boss. But how do we create moments to dawdle and linger and slow down and just appreciate, the moment, for what it is, whether you’re a, you know, an NBA superstar, a Fortune 100 CEO, a parent, whatever. So any final thoughts on that? If not, we can just kinda wrap this up and, go sit and do nothing for the next couple hours.

Dr. Linda Schubring: that’s not what this is about.

when you share that, that parenting advice, one of the things I love about Brian is, what a dad he is.

Brian Schubring: Hmm.

Dr. Linda Schubring: He’s a phenomenal father to, now a grown, beautiful woman. but when our daughter was young, Brian was always taking her on adventures.

There was always an adventure after school. There was, you know, new things happening all the time, and it allowed me to observe their relationship in some ways and then find ways to enter in. And one of, one of the things that I realized is that our daughter is very socially motivated. She wants to know all the nuances.

She looks around, and Brian trained her this way as well, but she looks around, who’s connecting to who, you know, what, what, what kind of things are happening. And I remember we took her skiing, and we went to, we went to, you know, we’re in the chalet, and she’s getting all booted up, and I’m not a skier, so I’m like a hot cocoa and sit by the fire, kind of wait for them to be done skiing.

But Brian’s like, “Hurry up. Get your boots on. Da, da, da. Da, da, da.” And she is looking everywhere, and I’m like, “Just, just let her take it in.”

Brian Schubring: That was hard to hear.

Dr. Linda Schubring: Let her take it in. And he’s like, “No, but we’ve gotta get out there.” I’m like, “She’s gotta know.” And that kind of pause, and so he was, you know, almost sitting on his hands.

but he then watched her.

Brian Schubring: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Linda Schubring: And then she just, the things that she saw and the things that she picked up in the environment, they are causing her to have great success in her world right now, in her mid-20s, because she was given some space to look around and see. and then she could jump into action rather quickly.

But if you give her a little bit of unhurried time, if you give children a bit of unhurried time- Hmm… and you’re not pushing them and rushing them, you will learn so much more- About them… about them, about their perspective, about what they need in order to be successful. And, yeah, I try to practice the same thing ’cause I definitely know hurried time. I get hurried time. I get anxious

Nathan Freeburg: Yeah. Go, go, go, go,

Dr. Linda Schubring: So I understand that as well, and I think that’s why it is a practice and an invitation to be unhurried. Brian, I’m I’m feeling Brian’s emotion of what was- Well,

Brian Schubring: I recall that- Oh, yeah… very moment because, of course, I wanted to get out skiing as fast as possible. And I was almost fully dressed, like I’m getting hot. Um, and when, when Linda said that, it was that moment as a parent where you’re like, “Oh, yeah, the orientation isn’t on how much time we can spend on the slopes, it’s that we are together.” And we are still nurturing the developing interests of this young person.

Dr. Linda Schubring: Yeah.

Brian Schubring: And as a parent, that is abundantly true, and I also think that the truth is true for us as adults- Yes… is how can we pay attention to what is asking to be nurtured inside of us? And, and I think it’s only in unhurried moments when we can actually hear the whispers of our developing self asking for us to pay attention.

“…how can we pay attention to what is asking to be nurtured inside of us? And, and I think it’s only in unhurried moments when we can actually hear the whispers of our developing self asking for us to pay attention.” ~ Brian Schubring

Dr. Linda Schubring: Yes.

Nathan Freeburg: Brian and Linda, thank you for, this kind of new way of looking at things and, and helping us to kind of, a little peek inside of your heads of what you’re sort of thinking about and wrestling with in your own journeys that is informing the way that you live and lead, and thanks for doing this.

Dr. Linda Schubring: Yeah. Thank you, Nathan

Nathan Freeburg: And thank you, listeners, for listening to the Leadership Vision podcast. If you would like to learn more about the work that we do with leaders, helping them kind of figure out what’s going on during uncertain times, you can click the link in the show notes or visit us on the web at leadershipvisionconsulting.com.

It’s kind of a mouthful. Click that link in the show notes. Also, follow us on all the socials, subscribe to our YouTube channel, and find this and subscribe and download wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Nathan Freeburg

Dr. Linda Schubring: Linda Schubring

Brian Schubring: And I’m Brian Schubring

Nathan Freeburg: on behalf of our team, thanks for listening.

All: Thanks for listening.