“What is without periods of rest will not endure.” —Ovid
Recently, I spent a few weeks on vacation. The time was filled with travel, reconnecting with family, playing golf, swimming, sleeping, and reading. As you can probably imagine, it was quite enjoyable. But more than that, it was desperately needed.
Consider the benefits that rest offers:
- a healthier body.
- more balance.
- less stress.
- deeper relationships.
- better opportunity to evaluate life’s direction.
- a new, fresh outlook.
- increased productivity.
Yet, despite all the proven benefits of rest, intentionally setting aside regular time for rest is a practice that has become undervalued and underappreciated in today’s culture. We have become overworked, overstressed, and exhausted. Yet, Sabbath (setting aside one day each week for rest) remains a dying practice that less and less people practice regularly (never mind the idea of actually taking a two-week vacation).
Overlooking the importance of rest is certainly not unique to our modern society. But our culture has made it increasingly difficult to take rest without specific intentionality.
Consider some of the factors prevalent in our modern society that argue against the idea of rest:
• Rest has become confused with laziness. We live in a society that praises those who work 60hrs/week and makes faulty assumptions about those who work 40. We have confused rest with laziness. And while too much rest may indeed be an indicator of sloth, the regular practice of finding rest is not.
• The desire for money has become unquenchable. Modern society loves money. We love it to a point that we will sacrifice much of ourselves to gain more of it. Some sacrifice morals, character, or family. Others consider rest a fair trade… and will gladly sacrifice it at the altar of the almighty dollar.
• Success is measured incorrectly. Similarly, we have begun to measure success by the amount of cash in savings, the size of our homes, or the model of our cars. The nicer one’s lot in life, the more successful they must be. Unfortunately, this is a faulty measure of success. The true test of success should be measured in significance rather than success. But often times finding significance requires us to rest long enough to recalibrate our lives around the things that matter most.
• We live in a world that is always “on”. While electricity may have made it easier to work late into the night, the Internet has surrounded us with opportunities and relationships 24 hours/day. Today’s world never stops. And when the possibility to make money every hour of the day is combined with the desire to do so, rest quickly gets pushed aside.
• A false sense of urgency surrounds us at every moment. We live in a world that floods our minds with so much information that it has become difficult to sort out the important from the unimportant. As a result, the urgent needs of the day crowd out the important. And rest puts up little fight against the urgent.
• Our minds require distraction. Our minds have become addicted to stimulation and validation. As a result, it has become increasingly difficult to turn off E-mail, Facebook, or Twitter… not to mention cell phones, televisions, or the Internet. And when our minds begin to require distraction, rest becomes an increasingly difficult state to achieve.
• Rest cannot be rushed. Modern society loves shortcuts. We desire 15-minute abs, 30-minute meals, and 1-hour photos. Unfortunately, rest can never be rushed. It must be entered deliberately and allowed to complete its cycle in due time. By definition, this requires patience… and a cleared schedule.
• A misunderstanding that rest is purely physical. Rest is physical. But it is more than that. It is mental, emotional, and spiritual. It is an understanding that the world is going to survive without you. It is an inner strength that allows you to disconnect from accomplishing “work” and focus on yourself and those around you. It is not mere physical leisure. It is rest: body and soul.
I have worked hard to keep a day of rest as an important part of my life and weekly routine. But it is an upward battle that requires relentless intentionality—we live in a culture that has far too often underappreciated its value.
Thank you for posting this! I have a really hard time with this. During the winter I substitute teach. I also have four kids, and even though I try to limit their activities so it doesn’t drive us nuts, we still find ourselves rushing dinner and running off to something multiple nights a week. Add to that family/friend obligations on weekends, and by the time June rolls around I’m exhausted!
By the end of the school year I felt completely burnt out, and as a result, I booked less camping for spring/July than I normally do, I didn’t race off to the beach a few days a week like I imagined I would, and I haven’t been biking every morning to maximize summer holidays. I think what I really needed was just decompression. So we kind of vegged through July. The kids played in the blow up pool in the back yard, we went to the park a few times, they crafted and read, and played with enormous piles of lego (we limit TV), and the whole time I’ve been feeling so guilty that I can’t just get motivated to “enjoy” summer, that I have actually kind of ruined the first half of summer for myself. I’ve been feeling like I’ve just wasted my kids time. And it’s not even like they’re complaining! Why are we so programmed to think that if we’re not burning through our “summer bucket list,” we’re simply squandering our time?
I’ve been trying to look at it differently, that the downtime is what we needed. We have a lengthy family camping trip planned that starts next week, and I know we’ll be busy with that, so what if we just moseyed around in July, right?
Just wish it was easier to “rest” without feeling crummy about it!
That is wonderful!
It is in the Bible. to take a rest from all of our labors. So, when GOd made man in His image, it was part of His great plan that man should have a rest. GOd knows what is best for His creatures. He loves us. When we don’t heed GOd’s words, we get sick. Most of all, GOd said: “Come to Me all you who are heavily ladden and I will give you rest. FOr My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
Thank you so much.
I would love love love to take one day a week and have it be 100% handheld/video technology free – i.e. no cell phone, no tablets, no tv, no computer. I foresee 100% abstinence being absolutely disastrous, unfortunately. I’d lose my mind just listening to the kids ask for some form of technology every 5 minutes. We do go camping periodically and there are no tablets allowed then, but the tv (with dvd’s) is still available. We’d have to have every minute of the day completely filled with activity to prevent people from using their technology, and that kind of defeats the purpose of resting, does it not? It’s a grand idea that I’ll continue to brainstorm – but you nailed it. Our minds seem to need constant stimulation anymore and unfortunately, conversation doesn’t seem to be enough.
So true.
Rest is crucial. I take rest every day, at least for a short while. Some days, I am able to disconnect from my worries and enter a state of awe. Other days my mind remains attached to the mundane. You are completely right that modern society has made it increasingly difficult to take rest and that it is an upward battle to achieve it. But to achieve regular rest is to achieve more balance. And balance is what this planet’s inhabitants so desperately need.
I have friends who proudly identify themselves as “Type A”, as if that were a state we should all be striving for.
It begins by realizing that our culture largely values shallow, meaningless things. Kids today live mostly indoors, and know little about nature. We live in a world of massive energy consumption, where everything is wrapped in plastic, and many Americans don’t even know where they are on the face of the earth. We follow those with the loudest voices and the least to say, as opposed to those who listen, learn, and have truth to share. We obliterate natural beauty and replace it with gaudy garbage, and we are rapidly killing our one and only home.
We need more rest, and a lot more reflection on the awesomeness of being.
“The most beautiful and most profound emotion we can experience is the sensation of the mystical. It is the source of all true science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead.”
–Albert Einstein