Off the back of National Stress Awareness Month in April, wellness expert Sarah Campus is exploring how slow and soft living can reduce the stressors of everyday life.
Sarah Campus is a highly experienced women’s personal trainer, nutrition coach, wellness expert, marathon-running mum of three, and the founder of LDN MUMS FITNESS.
After years of global uncertainty, digital overload, economic pressure, and an always-on work culture, stress seems to have become normalised. Slow living and soft living are two mindful responses to stress, each focusing on a different layer of wellbeing. Slow living is about pace and intention; it goes about structuring your life in a way that priorities presence, sustainability, and alignment with your values rather than constant urgency. It’s less about doing everything slowly and more about removing unnecessary rush so your nervous system and cortisol levels can settle.
Soft living is more about mindset and self- treatment. It emphasises self-compassion, emotional gentleness, and letting go of harsh productivity standards, encouraging you to rest without guilt and to approach yourself with kindness instead of pressure.
Both ways of life complement each other. Slow living reshapes how you move through your day, while soft living reshapes how you relate to yourself within it. Together, they create both external calm and internal ease, which are key to managing stress.
These concepts are resonating strongly right now because many people are feeling stretched to their limit. Slow living and soft living offer language for what people are actually craving – relief and a more humane way to exist. People are recognising that constant productivity isn’t sustainable and that success without wellbeing feels empty. Slow living pushes back against external pressure to rush and achieve at all costs, while soft living challenges the internal pressure to be endlessly self-critical.
A completely low stress life isn’t realistic because stress is a natural and sometimes helpful part of life. The more sustainable goal is better regulation which means building the capacity to respond to stress without becoming overwhelmed by it.
Instead of trying to eliminate stress, focus on managing your nervous system, setting boundaries, and recovering well.
Changing your relationship with stress starts with seeing it as information, not failure. Stress is your nervous system signalling that something feels demanding or important. When you respond with curiosity instead of self-criticism, you can ask what needs adjusting – it could be your pace, your boundaries, or the expectations you set on yourself.
Regulating your body also shifts your experience. Simple practices like slowing your breathing, resting properly, and reducing overload help your nervous system feel safer, which makes stress more manageable. Over time, stress becomes less of an enemy and more of a signal.
Micro-boundaries also matter such as not checking emails first thing or creating a short wind-down ritual at night. Even brief moments of presence, such as drinking your coffee without multitasking, signal safety to the body. It’s less about doing more and more about creating small pauses that allow your system to reset throughout the day.
Instead of packing your schedule with rules, choose a few small habits that genuinely make you feel steadier like a short walk or a mindful coffee. Build in flexibility and think of it as a framework, not a script; if a day shifts, you adjust without guilt.
One simple habit people can start straight away to live more softly is to schedule a short daily pause, just five minutes to check in with yourself. During that time, notice how you’re feeling, breathe slowly, and offer yourself a gentle thought like: “It’s okay to rest.” Doing this once a day but consistently trains your mind and body to slow down and respond to stress with kindness.