Hold your horses! Discover the secret of slow

Sports: Swing slowly
Like a lot of lousy golfers, each time I address the ball, I tell myself to take an easy, fluid pass. The gorilla-like lurch that ensues once led an orthopod companion to warn me about spinal damage. David Leadbetter, swing coach to greats such as Nick Faldo and Masters champ Trevor Immelman, says the secret to better scores is slowing down.

"Anxiety makes high handicappers move their arms and torsos far too quickly, which actually leads to less velocity for the club head," explains Leadbetter. The problem often stems from too much grip tension. It's tough to feel the ideal medium pressure, so as you address the ball, squeeze the grip too tightly for a moment, and then relax your grip so that it's clearly much too loose. "The tactile difference between the two extremes helps your brain guide your hands to the perfect tension-free grip in the middle," says Leadbetter.

While you're at it, try that breathing thing again. "I'm amazed by how many golfers hold their breath during their swing. Stress speeds them up," he says. Let your breath be a metronome. As you take the club back, start to exhale slowly. And then, as you start down, exhale a little more strongly and allow a nice whoosh of breath to escort you smoothly through contact to a full finish.

If you have trouble finding the brake, try these Leadbetter slow-down strategies: On your way to the course, drive a little more slowly than you normally do. As you walk between shots, stroll rather than striding purposefully. As you draw a club from your bag, do it gracefully rather than with a quick jerk.

Fatherhood: Steam slowly
I'm not against all paternal anger. In fact, I think anger gets a bad rap in these be-their-buddy days, and a righteous father's wrath can actually be useful to a child. But I was often guilty of instant anger — the flash, the instinctive bark that can be our gender's default response to vexation or dread. Here's the line that sees right through me, courtesy of psychiatrist Bruno Bettelheim: "We become very upset when we believe we see in a child aspects of our own personalities of which we disapprove."

When you feel anger rising, slow yourself — maybe for just a beat or two, or maybe for a night to sleep on it — and consider whether the child has really earned your anger. If, on reflection, the answer is yes, so be it. But be sure he's not just a handy target for the scorn you feel for the guy in the mirror.

Brainpower: Absorb slowly
We're encouraged to read fast. Those kids who zipped through the SAT got four years at palaces such as Princeton and Duke. But reading slowly will not only help us remember more, but may also make us more creative. "If you go so fast that you don't focus, you're wasting time, not saving it," says Barry Gordon, MD, PhD, professor of neurology and cognitive science at Johns Hopkins Medical School and the author of Intelligent Memory. The best way to focus more effectively is to slow down.

If you have some reading to do — let's say your attorney insists you read the whole indictment — make time for two passes. "The first read is to absorb the general themes," says Dr. Gordon. "Once you have those organizers in your head, you'll be able to store more details from the second pass." Think of making memories as a weaving process, suggests Dr. Gordon. "The more threads of cross-connections, the more context you can create for a memory, so the more durable it will be."

Slowing down can also lead to frame-breaking ideas. "A boost in creativity connected to a slower, more methodical approach is reported in much of the problem-solving literature," says Dr. Gordon. He cites a famous film of Jackson Pollock at work, specifically moments when the artist pauses, seemingly to assess what he has done and to allow himself the time to "see" differently, to jump out of the grooves of going on automatic with his faster mind. So whether you're trying to reinvent microfinance or break down a match-up zone, if you slow your mind's momentum, you may allow it to find a new way.

Fitness: Sculpt slowly
If personal trainers, as a group, were allowed to give their charges only one piece of advice, they might well choose the importance of maintaining form when lifting, which often means going more slowly. "Many people lift weights too quickly, which interferes with their ability to reach their peak performance," says Suzanne Meth, who runs E, the VIP fitness studio at Equinox health club. "They have a get-this-over-with urge, and they lose form and control of the weights." If you do reps too fast, you can get a bounce effect, meaning the weight rebounds off the bottom of the movement. It short-changes the muscle. "Come to a full stop at the end of each rep," advises Meth. Slowing down and keeping your form is the best way to isolate your muscles and maximize your strength potential.

Another way to slow down is to do exercises that require holding a position for a period of time, which is an effective way to train important muscle groups. Tired of hundreds of repetitions of crunches? Kyle Brown, a San Diego-based personal trainer, recommends the plank and the vacuum exercises for the transverse abdominus. "The muscle fibers of the transverse abdominus run across the abdomen, and when the muscle contracts, it stabilizes your pelvis and thoracic spine," says Brown. "The plank and the vacuum create a virtual weight belt to support your lower spine." Spinal stabilization comes in handy when carrying drowsy children in from the car or lugging a recycling barrel to the curb on newspaper pick-up day.

Style: Dazzle slowly
Stylish men move just a heartbeat more slowly than the ho-hum majority. Your Uncle Ned is fidgety; Cary Grant was graceful and at ease. Woody Allen is frantic; Johnny Depp, even as the gaudy Captain Jack, seems to have a private cadence in his head. Style moves with dispatch, but never rushes. It doesn't scurry or blurt things out. Its wisdom won't wilt while waiting. The wile known as style may require a barely-there across-the-board deceleration. Walk just a little less quickly. Talk as though people will give your thoughts some time. Never hurry wine into a glass, or beer into a mug. Even loosen your tie with languor. Style savors the journey, not just the destination. Remember the age-old wisdom: He who has command of others is powerful, but he who has command of himself is mighty.

Craftmanship: Saw slowly
"Every job-site accident since time began is traceable to hurrying," says Norm Abram, master carpenter and host of This Old House and New Yankee Workshop, both on PBS. "If you slow down, you'll save time, prevent injuries, and do better work." Consider your handsaw technique. "Lots of guys use too short strokes," says Abram, "and they fall into a too quick back-and-forth action. Most saws are designed for a longer push-pull, and extending the stroke gets you more efficiency." Want to hammer a nail just right? "Fight the get-this-done attitude lots of men have. Focus on the nail head, remind yourself to go more slowly, and you'll find a rhythm that is quick but unhurried." Craftsmanship is slower than less skilled work. "Remember the carpenter's methodical mantra: Measure twice, cut once," says Abram.

Friendship: Sip slowly
"People have a million different ideas about how to drink bourbon," says Dave Pickerell, a bourbon distillery expert who prefers it poured into a shaker with ice, rattled around for three seconds, and then poured off the ice into a double old-fashioned glass. "But none of it matters if you don't drink it slowly. Bourbon is about sharing and sitting around at the end of the day. There's something about it that encourages fellowship and good humor. It's a sipping whiskey."

Career: Speak slowly
"The most common mistake people make in presentations is speaking too quickly," says Stephen Tollefson, lecturer and director of the teaching improvement office at the University of California at Berkeley. "We go too fast because at the top of the talk, we don't make a connection with the audience and we get anxious. You have to start with a linker, a sentence that links you to the crowd. It doesn't have to be anything particularly brilliant, just something that humanizes you." So in Kansas, you've been a fan of the Wichita State Shockers since you were a kid. (By the way, it has to be true.)

"Reading a speech is also a speeder-upper," says Tollefson. "If you need the text typed out, print it in large all-caps, highlight the key points in yellow, and then 'converse' your way from one highlighted passage to the next." And don't get locked in place behind a podium. Movement will relax you and slow you down.

Since I've gone slow, I've started to feel my new pace polishing up my life. My amusing stories, which I now ease through, are just a tad more amusing. My golf game has improved dramatically. Not long ago, my wife, while naked, asked me to do "that slow thing you did last time" and she seemed to enjoy it... several times. As I've slowed everything down — from slicing carrots to shaving — I've felt my serenity and, more important, my competence, growing. Now, whenever I'm having a tough time with something, whether it's drilling a pilot hole or getting a point across in a meeting, I just do it a touch more slowly. Invariably, improvement ensues.

I find myself inspired by the hopefulness shared by many of the experts I spoke with, their sense that we're obliged by our enormous potential to take our time. "We think we don't have time to care for ourselves, to cook well, to eat slowly," said nutritionist Dr. Katz, of Yale, "but if we don't take the time now, we'll just spend it in hospitals later." When golf man Leadbetter said, "You have to dance with the club," there was longing in his voice, a hope that we might find a deep life rhythm as well as a birdie now and then. And now I've moved past strategy to the softness that I had first eschewed. Maybe there is something in taking the time to notice the shape of a woman's clavicle or the quality of the light in the late afternoon. Maybe our hearts and lungs and taste buds and professional plans would all work better, and maybe our lives would be sweeter and more successful, if we stopped lurching and rushing movements or emotions or sentences that could benefit from just another moment to ripen on the vine.