What a beautiful poem and such a relatable piece. Even now I struggle with this sometimes, the having to and wanting to do when the most productive and healthy thing would be to rest. As you said it remains a practice as we recondition deep patterns inherited from a society that works against the nature of humans. Lots of love and thanks for your beautiful writing!
This rang so true to me, Lisa. I did an exercise in therapy yesterday unpacking my thoughts/feelings, which I thought were anxiety about the future, but turned out to be sadness around my disability. It's so easy to let that self-compassionate voice slip away. I'm making a commitment to using that voice with myself, and I am so inspired by the compassion with which you write!!
Aw thank you, Sage! Can I just take a moment to celebrate you for doing that exercise? Sounds like it was illuminating. I love the idea of making that commitment to yourself! And I honestly needed the reminder today, so I appreciate you bringing me back here. 🫶
Such a great, intricate, challenging, familiar, much needed topic to speak of!
Rest was my number one need for YEARS. It was also up there with my greatest of all struggles.
I always said to my healing coach (yoga teacher/bodywork therapist) that the reason I stayed severely ill for so long over some time of each month was because I would have gone back to my old ways. The way it happened ingrained them in me for life.
I later came to learn it was also easier to be severely ill than learn these lessons.
That’s how hard tending to your body’s needs can be when your survival has been dependant upon compliance.
Thanks Amber, I’m really glad it’s sparked some conversation!
It’s so tough when you have survival instincts to contend with…I can say something about that as well
I found it was easier to love myself into resting when I felt that I was financially sound. As savings dwindled and I started to feel unsafe in that way, I stopped floating and started feeling like I was swimming against a current again. It’s a lot!
I totally believe our financial health is also one pillar of our health (that doesn’t get talked about).
I’ve done a huge piece on finances in my upcoming book for this reason (but it was so hard to write!).
I talk a lot about the struggle with slowing down and the one 3 month work break I gifted in my most popular and engaged article. You might have already seen it but it goes some way to talking about the impact of worrying about money on our health (it kept me sick for years longer and I missed that insight which had a detrimental impact on me):
Oo I don’t know if I’ve been called to dive in until now, these things have a way of finding us when we need them and are ready to engage! Thank you for sharing, very much looking forward to reading.
Honestly? Because rest blows ass when you feel like ass. (Sorry, I had to say it.) How many times have I "honored my need for rest", laid down, and realized...the pain and agony and fog and malaise is actually really effin unbearable when I have to just sit in it? Like, to the point where I actually feel much more discouraged and traumatized AFTER intentional rest.
Or at its most mid...it's just boring. I'm not resting in a clean home with good scents, dust motes dancing in sunbeams, comfortable. I'm resting in a hot mess, resentfully.
Sometimes there really are good rests though...and I resent those too and don't wanna! Then I remember how helpful they are when I do them. But JEEZ it's a gamble on which one you get...
I should write a column about what I do when rest is too awful to contemplate.
I hear you, Kira. It’s pretty brutal when the thing that would help us most feels impossible to bear.
My brain has (probably strategically) blurred my memory of hell, but it still comes up as resistance when I go to rest. The association is in there deep, even now.
I was musing from a specific place in my recovery when rest *doesn’t* suck, but I also wrote about rest when it super sucked. That one’s called “Feeling Everything.”
You have my wheels turning for another post as well. Thank you for the food for thought!
I’d like to read such a column. Slowing down was one of the most challenging things I’ve ever done.
And you’ve hit the head on identifying the emotion that awaits….resentment was the first main emotion to come up for me (resentment over everything - my childhood, my work life, some big choices/changes I’d made. It was a lot.)
What a beautiful poem and such a relatable piece. Even now I struggle with this sometimes, the having to and wanting to do when the most productive and healthy thing would be to rest. As you said it remains a practice as we recondition deep patterns inherited from a society that works against the nature of humans. Lots of love and thanks for your beautiful writing!
Thank you so much for reading and saying such kind things! Means a lot coming from you. Lots of love to you!
This rang so true to me, Lisa. I did an exercise in therapy yesterday unpacking my thoughts/feelings, which I thought were anxiety about the future, but turned out to be sadness around my disability. It's so easy to let that self-compassionate voice slip away. I'm making a commitment to using that voice with myself, and I am so inspired by the compassion with which you write!!
Aw thank you, Sage! Can I just take a moment to celebrate you for doing that exercise? Sounds like it was illuminating. I love the idea of making that commitment to yourself! And I honestly needed the reminder today, so I appreciate you bringing me back here. 🫶
Such a great, intricate, challenging, familiar, much needed topic to speak of!
Rest was my number one need for YEARS. It was also up there with my greatest of all struggles.
I always said to my healing coach (yoga teacher/bodywork therapist) that the reason I stayed severely ill for so long over some time of each month was because I would have gone back to my old ways. The way it happened ingrained them in me for life.
I later came to learn it was also easier to be severely ill than learn these lessons.
That’s how hard tending to your body’s needs can be when your survival has been dependant upon compliance.
Thanks Amber, I’m really glad it’s sparked some conversation!
It’s so tough when you have survival instincts to contend with…I can say something about that as well
I found it was easier to love myself into resting when I felt that I was financially sound. As savings dwindled and I started to feel unsafe in that way, I stopped floating and started feeling like I was swimming against a current again. It’s a lot!
I totally believe our financial health is also one pillar of our health (that doesn’t get talked about).
I’ve done a huge piece on finances in my upcoming book for this reason (but it was so hard to write!).
I talk a lot about the struggle with slowing down and the one 3 month work break I gifted in my most popular and engaged article. You might have already seen it but it goes some way to talking about the impact of worrying about money on our health (it kept me sick for years longer and I missed that insight which had a detrimental impact on me):
https://open.substack.com/pub/warriorwithin/p/on-slowing-down
Oo I don’t know if I’ve been called to dive in until now, these things have a way of finding us when we need them and are ready to engage! Thank you for sharing, very much looking forward to reading.
Honestly? Because rest blows ass when you feel like ass. (Sorry, I had to say it.) How many times have I "honored my need for rest", laid down, and realized...the pain and agony and fog and malaise is actually really effin unbearable when I have to just sit in it? Like, to the point where I actually feel much more discouraged and traumatized AFTER intentional rest.
Or at its most mid...it's just boring. I'm not resting in a clean home with good scents, dust motes dancing in sunbeams, comfortable. I'm resting in a hot mess, resentfully.
Sometimes there really are good rests though...and I resent those too and don't wanna! Then I remember how helpful they are when I do them. But JEEZ it's a gamble on which one you get...
I should write a column about what I do when rest is too awful to contemplate.
I hear you, Kira. It’s pretty brutal when the thing that would help us most feels impossible to bear.
My brain has (probably strategically) blurred my memory of hell, but it still comes up as resistance when I go to rest. The association is in there deep, even now.
I was musing from a specific place in my recovery when rest *doesn’t* suck, but I also wrote about rest when it super sucked. That one’s called “Feeling Everything.”
You have my wheels turning for another post as well. Thank you for the food for thought!
I’d like to read such a column. Slowing down was one of the most challenging things I’ve ever done.
And you’ve hit the head on identifying the emotion that awaits….resentment was the first main emotion to come up for me (resentment over everything - my childhood, my work life, some big choices/changes I’d made. It was a lot.)