We began this chapter on work (https://www.nudeandhappy.com/2025/11/25/the-productivity-trap-working-with-purpose/) with me sitting clothed at a desk, dog whining, soul exhausted by the tyranny of productivity apps. Then we stripped away the armor and dared to be authentic, vulnerable, and empathic at work. And we found our why (that warm stone in the pocket) and watched ordinary jobs turn quietly revolutionary when guided by it.
Today we walk the final stretch together, barefoot and unhurried, because everything we’ve done so far only holds if we refuse to sprint while carrying it. This is the slow work revolution, and it is built on the same respect that naturism has taught me for thirty years: respect for my own body and limits, respect for the bodies and limits of others, and respect for the living body of the earth that keeps all of us alive.
A memory, soft as morning mist.
It is late October. I wake without an alarm. The house is quiet, the dog still curled at the foot of the bed. I pad naked to the kitchen, make coffee, carry it outside. The air is cold enough to raise gooseflesh, but I don’t reach for a robe. I sit on the stone bench, feel the chill bite my skin, and I wait. Ten minutes. Twenty. The sun crests the hill, touches my shoulders, and suddenly the cold is perfect. I am not enduring it; I am in conversation with it. My breath slows. My heart slows. The day has not yet asked anything of me, and I have not yet asked anything of the day. This is the pace I now bring to work.
Slow work is not laziness.
Slow work is not anti-ambition.
Slow work is deliberate respect made visible.
Respect for self
When I rush, I override the signals my body has evolved over millions of years: the tightness in the chest that says “rest,” the fog in the mind that says “you need sleep,” the ache in the lower back that says “move differently.” Clothes can hide those signals; nudity never does. Sunburn tells me exactly how long is enough. Cold tells me when to step inside. Hunger, thirst, fatigue; they speak plainly on bare skin. Over the years I have learned to treat those messages as sacred data, not inconveniences. The same respect now governs my calendar: if my body says four deep-work hours is the honest limit today, I honour it. The output is smaller on paper, richer in truth.
Respect for others
When I rush, I demand that colleagues, collaborators, family, and friends match my manufactured urgency. I send the 10 p.m. email that steals their sleep. I schedule the “quick call” that eats their dinner. I praise the person who answers at midnight and quietly punish the one who protects their evening. That is disrespect dressed as dedication. In naturist spaces I have watched the opposite happen a thousand times: someone says “I’m cold, I’m going inside,” and the entire group honours it without judgment. No one is shamed for having a body with needs. Slow work imports that etiquette into offices, studios, and fields. It sounds like: “Take the time you need; the project will still be here tomorrow.” It sounds like real deadlines instead of fake ones. It sounds like turning off Slack after 6 p.m. and trusting the world will not end.
Respect for the earth
When I rush, I externalise every cost. Overtime means more lights left burning, more takeaway containers, more flights for “essential” meetings, more servers humming 24/7 for cloud tools I barely use. Hurry is the original extractive industry. Slow work asks: What is the honest pace this piece of land, this team, this body, this season can sustain without breaking? In regenerative farming communities across the world, growers prioritizing soil regeneration through cover cropping, reduced tillage, and diverse rotations often accept modestly lower short-term yields. In return, they gain richer soil organic matter, greater biodiversity with returning birds and beneficial insects, improved water retention, and bodies less strained by intensive machinery. In the tech world, teams adopting deliberate release cycles—shipping thoughtful, well-tested updates less frequently—report not only higher user satisfaction from complete, reliable features but also meaningful reductions in server energy demands, as fewer rushed deployments mean less constant computational overhead. Less frantic pace, more lasting nourishment.
These three respects are not separate. They are the same respect, seen from different angles. Naturism simply makes the connection undeniable: when I respect the limits of my own naked skin under the sun, I learn to respect the limits of your skin, and of the thin skin of topsoil that feeds us both.
Here is what the slow work revolution looks like in ordinary weeks.
Monday: Single-tasking mornings
When I don’t have customer engagements, I work naked at the desk until noon (door locked, dog asleep). One project. No music, no notifications, no second screen. Every hour or so, I stand up, stretch, step outside for five minutes of sun or rain on skin. I return clearer. The same task that used to take six fractured hours now takes three whole ones.
Afternoon is calls, meetings and smaller tasks, but nudity prevails, as it’s my number one productivity attire.
Tuesday: Deep work, shallow admin
Emails and messages are processed in two bounded windows: 11–11:30 and 16:30–17:00. Everything else waits. People quickly learn I am not ignoring them; I am protecting the space where real thinking happens.
Wednesday: Walking meetings
When possible, with local collaborators we meet at the trailhead, leave phones in the car, walk naked when the path allows. Decisions made mid-stride under trees have saved us more time and money than any Zoom ever did.
Thursday: “No-meeting Thursday”
Reserved for making: writing, thinking, creating, designing; whatever my why is hungry for. Output is visible on project trackers and priceless everywhere else.
Friday: Reflection and release
At 15:00 I close the laptop, pour a beer or tea, sit naked on the porch and ask three questions:
- What nourished me this week?
- What drained me?
- What one adjustment will I make next week?
Then I let the week go. No weekend catch-up. No Sunday dread. Relax, friends, DIY, family fun, whatever comes.
This rhythm did not arrive overnight. It took two years of deliberate slowing, of saying no to lucrative urgency, of trusting that the world would not punish me for moving at the speed of a human animal instead of a server farm. The punishment never came. The rewards keep arriving: deeper relationships, better ideas, healthier soil, a body that no longer wakes in panic at 4 a.m.
You do not need my exact schedule. You only need to begin where you are.
- Start with one protected morning.
- Start with one honest “no” to a 8 p.m. call.
- Start by asking, every time you feel the itch to hurry: “Whose limits am I ignoring; mine, theirs, or the planet’s?”
The slow work revolution is not a luxury for those who can afford it. It is the only way any of us will still have bodies, communities, and a biosphere worth working for in twenty years.
As we close this chapter on working with purpose, carry this with you: The productivity trap promised meaning through volume.
Authenticity gave us courage to be real.
A clear why gave us direction.
And slowness; respectful, deliberate, naked-hearted slowness; gives us permanence.
The same sun that warms my bare shoulders this morning is warming yours, wherever you are. Let it set the pace.
Strip Nude, Stay Nude, Live Nude and Share the Nude Love!
