Live The Comma

"Can you start your stopwatch?"

Every Sunday night, my son pulls out his reading fluency worksheet, and asks me to pull out my stop watch.

His goal is to read as many words in one minute as he can.
He has 5 tries.

As you can guess, he gets progressively better as he re-reads the same text over and over again.

Last night, I was "regular" reading with him and realized that he is so predisposed to read quickly, that he doesn't pause at the commas.

He just barrels right past them.

As a result, his reading lacks engagement, and color.

I wonder if it's the same when he reads inside his own head.

It reminded me of the poem, FILLING MY PURSE WITH COMMAS by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

💜 All afternoon, each time I think I should hurry,
I pull out a comma,
such humble punctuation,
and invite it into the moment--

💚 and the comma does what it always does,
which is to invite a pause,
a small pause, of course,
but a pause long enough to breathe,
to notice what else is happening,
a slight suggestion that right here is a perfect place to rest,

💙 yes, how funny I never noticed before
that the comma itself
looks as if it’s bowing,
nodding its small dark head to what is,
encouraging us to find a brief silence and then,
thus refreshed,
to go on.

I like to think that my work with organizations is all about LIVING THE COMMA.

It's so easy to read a book and put it back on the shelf, before turning to the next one.

But what I invite is different.

I invite the pause.
I invite the comma.
I invite the slowing down and connecting.

Connecting the ideas to yourself.
Connecting the ideas to your colleagues.
Connecting the ideas to how you work.
Connecting the ideas to the impact you want to make in the world.

That's why my motto is "READ DEEPER NOT FASTER"

Do you intentionally create pause in your life? If so, how?

Originally posted on LinkedIn with comments.
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Read Deeper Not Faster