Two Sylvias' Weekly Muse: June 4, 2023

Issue 58

Hello Muse Readers!

Last August in the Weekly Muse we talked about a movement afoot called slow living wherein practitioners take a stand against “hustle culture,” which tells us we must be productive in every moment of our lives. We gave an example of a YouTube “productivity video” suggesting you read a book as you brush your teeth—book in one hand and toothbrush in the other, so that you aren’t “wasting time.”

Slow living’s philosophy tells us that sometimes working at a snail’s pace is a positive thing as we prioritize quality over quantity. And speaking of reading books while brushing our teeth (a “productivity practice” we think is ridiculous!), we came across “Slow Reading in a Hurried Age,” by author and English professor David Mikics from the University of Houston. In writing about hustle culture and how we have become accustomed to reading only small chunks of text at a time (quickness is highly prized nowadays!), Mikics says that retraining our brains to read at a slow and at…