Aljawharah Saleh Al-Qazlan

At Ease... I Found Life

July 19, 2026 - 00:00 | Last updated July 19, 2026 - 00:00

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At a transient waiting station, amid the noise of travelers and the silence of strangers, a woman sat next to me whom I did not know, but she carried with her a story I knew well. She told me she had recently moved from Riyadh to the Eastern Province, and that something inside her had changed that she could not initially explain. She said that previously she used to run without reaching her destination, racing against time, until her nervous system, as she described it, was constantly on alert. But here, after moving to the city, she began reaching her work in minutes, completing her tasks without being swallowed by the crowds, and returning home with still plenty of time left in her day; not just for hobbies, but for a silence she had not realized she was missing. 'The city of calm and tranquility,' that's what she told me, and this calm brought me back to myself a little, for what that woman did not tell me in words, but awakened within me, was that she was describing without naming: the art of slow living.

This art is not laziness or a slowdown from life, but rather an elevation of quality over quantity. Confucius says: 'It does not matter how slowly you go, as long as you do not stop.' In this saying lies the wisdom of one who knows that the journey is not measured by the distance covered in record time, but by steadfastness on the path. Gandhi goes a little further in his awareness by saying: 'There is more to life than increasing its speed,' as if he poses the question: Where are we running to, and what do we lose on the way there?

For slow living, at its core, is a call to liberate oneself from two intertwined anxieties: the fear of a future that has not yet come, and regret for a past that will not return. It is a call to live 'here and now,' nothing else. When Eckhart Tolle says: 'The present is all we ever have.' It is as if he reminds us that everything we truly possess is confined to this moment, and anything else is merely an illusion we have created ourselves. Lao Tzu adds to this by saying: 'If you are depressed, you are living in the past; if you are anxious, you are living in the future; if you are at peace, you are living in the present.' So peace, then, is not the absence of feelings, but complete presence in the moment — 'the present.' And how beautiful is what Mark Twain said as a warning about a habit that has stolen the moment from us: 'Do not let yesterday consume too much of today.'

And here I realized, from that fleeting conversation, that place alone does not create peace, and that changing cities is not the solution, but rather a way of life.

How many people have moved from noise to calm, only to carry their noise with them. The truth is deeper than geography: it is you who must cultivate the culture of slow living, even in a city dominated by a fast pace. The point is not to find a quiet place, but to be the calm wherever you are. So be the first to plant the culture of slow living in a collective awareness that does not recognize the value of presence, always be here and now... for I am at ease... I found life.

In a transient waiting station, amidst the noise of travelers and the silence of strangers, a woman sat next to me whom I did not know, but she carried with her a story I knew well. She told me that she had recently moved from Riyadh to the Eastern Province, and that something inside her had changed in a way she couldn't initially explain. She said that previously she used to run without reaching her destination, racing against time, until her nervous system, as she described it, was constantly on alert. However, here, after moving to the city; she began to reach her work in minutes, completing her tasks without being swallowed by the crowds, and returning home with still plenty of time left in her day; not just for hobbies, but for a silence she hadn’t realized she was missing. “The city of calm and tranquility,” that’s what she told me, and this calm brought me back to myself a little, for what that woman didn’t tell me in words, but awakened within me, was that she was describing without naming: the art of slow living.

This art is not laziness or a slowdown from life, but rather an elevation of quality over quantity. Confucius says: “It does not matter how slowly you go, as long as you do not stop.” In this saying lies the wisdom of one who knows that the journey is not measured by the distance covered in record time, but by steadfastness on the path. Gandhi goes a little further in his awareness by saying: “There is more to life than increasing its speed,” as if he poses the question: Where are we running to, and what do we lose on the way there?

For slow living, at its core, is a call to liberate oneself from two intertwined anxieties: the fear of a future that has not yet come, and the regret for a past that will not return. It is a call to live “here and now,” nothing else. When Eckhart Tolle says: “The present is all we ever have.” It’s as if he reminds us that everything we truly possess is confined to this moment, and anything else is merely an illusion we have created ourselves. Lao Tzu adds to this by saying: “If you are depressed, you are living in the past; if you are anxious, you are living in the future; if you are at peace, you are living in the present.” So, peace, then, is not the absence of feelings, but a complete presence in the moment, that is, “the present.” And how beautiful is what Mark Twain said as a warning to us from a habit that has stolen the moment from us: “Do not let yesterday consume too much of today.”

And here I realized, from that fleeting conversation, that the place alone does not create peace, and that changing cities is not the solution, but rather a way of life.

How many people have moved from noise to calm, only to carry their noise with them. The truth is deeper than geography: it is you who must cultivate the culture of slow living, even in a city dominated by a fast pace. The point is not to find a quiet place, but to be the calm wherever you are. So be the first to plant the culture of slow living in a collective awareness that does not recognize the value of presence, always be here and now... for I am at ease... I found life.