e132 slow - how does the pace of speech relate to the sound of modernity?

my zen practice taught me that unhurried speech invites us to slow down

EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

(bell and breath)

When I was a student at the White Wind Zen Community in Ottawa I had the privilege of listening to recorded teachings by Ven. Anzan Hoshin roshi. You can hear some his recording on wwzc.org.

During these teisho, the roshi speaks very slowly, with a lot of silence between words, a bit like what I’m doing now.

Silence between words.

As well as words between silence.

Now I love listening to spoken words at this kind of slow pace. 

It invites other sounds to permeate the acoustic space, such as the traffic that is in the background now, a bit of birdsong, muffled sounds. 

But we can also notice other things like our breath - it’s pace, depth, odor, weight - so many dimensions that we usually don't pay attention to and minute movements such as cracking of the floor from the weight of the chair, oscillations of light and so many details we normally don’t notice.

I love the way spoken words linger in the air, hugging the clouds and floating down like rain or snow.

I love the way unhurried speech invites us to slow down.

So you might ask : how does the pace of speech relate to the sound of modernity?

The sound of modernity is the opposite of slowness. It’s fast moving and generally saturated, isn’t it?

Constant in overdrive, with technology accelerating our lives, faster and faster every day, 

We seem to have lost touch with slowness - there’s my phone reminded me to be fast.

We’ve also lost touch with the notion, the feeling of distance. 

So I’m going to slowly walk away from this microphone, while repeating this narration again as an exercise in listening to slowness but also to distance. 

Thanks for listening. 

(Gets up and walks away)

When I was a student at the White Wind Zen Community in Ottawa I had the privilege of listening to recordings of teachings, by Ven. Anzan Hoshin roshi. You can hear some on wwzc.org.

During these teisho, the roshi speaks very slowly, with a lot of silence between words, like I am speaking now.

Silence between words.

Words between silence.

I love listening to spoken words at a slow pace…

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For more information on the White Wind Zen Community, see https://wwzc.org/

I am grateful and accountable to the earth and the human labour that provided me with the privilege of producing this episode. (including all the toxic materials and extractive processes behind the computers, recorders, transportation and infrastructure that make this podcast possible).

My gesture of reciprocity for this episode is to White Wind Zen Community.

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I am grateful and accountable to the earth and the human labour that provided me with the privilege of producing this podcast, including the toxic materials and extractive processes behind the computers, recorders, transportation systems and infrastructure that made this production possible. 

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Claude Schryer

Latest update on March 21, 2026