Why Rest Isn’t Lazy—It’s Essential

Do You Ever Feel This Way?

Have you ever felt like you just don’t want to do anything?

You want to say, “Forget it,” and stop? That’s how I’ve been feeling for the past few weeks. I kept asking myself, “Is it hormones? Burnout? Boredom?”

Maybe it’s all of those things. This feeling isn’t new for me. I’ve felt this way at the end of every year.

When it happens, I feel so guilty. Guilty for not doing enough. Guilty for trying to convince myself it’s okay to rest. But I’ve learned something about this pattern. When I feel this way, what I really need is rest. It’s like my body and mind are waving a flag, telling me to pause before I hit burnout.

I wonder how many women end up feeling like this because they didn’t make rest part of their lives?

I just read How to Love a Woman by Clarissa Pinkola Estés. You may have read  her other book Women Who Run with the Wolves. She’s a psychologist, a trauma expert, and she leads the Carl Jung Institute in San Diego. In the book, she talks about how women need four weeks of work and then one week of full rest. That adds up to 11 weeks of rest every year.

When I first read that, I thought, “Well, I do go on vacations and trips with friends and family.” But then I realized something. A lot of us think that if we aren’t working, we must be resting. But is that really true?

I started asking myself, “What does resting even mean to me?” 

Rest isn’t just doing nothing. I think rest is about saying, “Forget the rules,” and giving myself permission to do what I want for a week. If my body needs to sleep in, I’ll do it. If I feel like reading, creating, or just being still, that’s okay too.

Rest for me means breathing deeply, doing things that make me feel alive, sleeping as much as I need, and spending time on what truly refills me. It’s about nourishing myself in a way that makes me feel whole again.

When I don’t rest, I feel like I’m just trying to stay above water. But when I take the time to truly rest, I feel like I’m floating and even flowing with life again.

That’s when I feel most connected to myself and the world around me.

My Seed Questions this Week: 

Do you take time to rest? Do you feel guilty for doing so? What does real rest look like for you?