To Rest Rest is to do things slowly without rushing Rest is to give a gift to your mind and in turn, your body may rest too Rest is to hear the conversations in your mind and to recognise the figments of your own imagination accumulated across all these days Rest is to put things down instead of picking things up Rest is to worry less about moving backwards Rest is to disrupt your plans Rest is to surrender to the calls of that which is bigger than you Rest is to admit that enough is enough Rest is to give in to your heaviness Rest is to meet yourself where you are so that in time you may fully meet the ones you love Rest is to stay faithful that your loved ones will not leave you behind Rest is moments of silence Rest is what you need when you are going faster than your capacity to run besides yourself Rest is what you need to engage Rest is what you need to hear the sounds of your own wisdom that cannot come from thoughts or running around never intending to stop Rest is to rest, is to rest, is to rest
Do you remember the days when you were a child? I remember mine vaguely. I experienced time differently then. It was slower. Many say that, “Life was uncomplicated then.” In some ways, when I reflect on those times versus where I am now, at the age of 29, I wouldn’t say that they were better. I am not sure also that “uncomplicated” is also the right word to use here.
I would say that it was a different time in my life. In all of our human lives. When I think back about the paths I walked on over all these years since my childhood, the different journeys I took, the trials and tribulations I had, the times when I worked hard in my endeavours, I am proud. I think that as humans, as we continue to grow physically and get “older,” we are constantly expanding. From studying to finding our vocations to moving away from family to travelling to living with others to living by ourselves to starting a family, to starting a business, the list will continue. As each seemingly challenging next thing comes into our lives, we seem to prove time and time again that we had been ready all along. We had been ready to experience a part of ourselves that we didn’t meet in our previous years, let alone last week, but now, despite whatever may have happened in the middle, we did it.
We did it. We learn that we are deserving of ourselves for greatness, as told by our eyes and our eyes only. We learn that we can have responsibilities and not do a shabby job at taking care of a household! Above all, we learn that we are human.
Reminiscing about our childhoods can be a great nostalgic past time, and for a brief second, dwelling in those memories, we forget where we are. It is a sweet time. But like all times, as my grandmother would say, “Time waits for no one.”
Although the rhythm of our lives are now dictated mostly by our purest of intentions, I think it is very easy these days to not only distract ourselves but to do it without any realisation. Our smart phones are a quick and easy fix for masking our discomfort and pain. We can now choose to feel temporary moments of joy and laughter without going into the root cause of our heaviness and pain.
Things are moving faster these days because technology is developing quickly. Expectations from our loved ones and ourselves are heightened to send an instant reply and our clients expect completed work to arrive in their inbox faster than you have sufficient hands to perform their task.
And if we are still twiddling our thumbs, we think to ourselves that we are not being useful members of society. Everyone is doing something and if we don’t start now, we will surely be left behind. So we jump on the most popular self help programs or a shiny new thing that everyone is doing, maybe even fooling ourselves that finally now, we are worthy and are useful, but ultimately, losing faith in ourselves and perhaps the grand intelligence of time and space. We end up rushing into conclusions to not feel the pain or the heaviness we are deep down feeling in the first place.
I think you understand what I’m trying to say here- there are many triggers. There are many triggers to stop us from getting a true form of rest, in both body and in mind.
If there is something that I would like to take away from my experience during the pandemic- from the last two years, is how I learned to develop the ability to rest fully. I wrote this poem as a reminder to myself, and hopefully for you too, that should we catch a moment where we feel like our mental and physical states are overwhelmed, that we rest. We rest as though nothing else on this Earth mattered. That we feel like we have the permission to take ourselves to a place where nothing else exists but the quiet whispers of our inner wisdom.
This wisdom that allows us to have a bigger perspective of our life. This wisdom that functions without time but with endless amounts of patience and faith.
Resting is simpler than we think. Most often, it starts with a strong intention, a decisive state of mind, that mostly come from having had enough, and to stop believing in everything our minds are telling us that we should be doing.
You see, I’ve noticed lately this part of my brain that wants to always solve problems by doing things or taking things on. That when I have a particular problem or challenge in my life, that in order to solve it, I should be thinking about it constantly or else nothing will get done, or the problem will get the better of me!
But in rest, our problems will seem minuscule and solvable. We will meet ourselves without any other external noise but hear our bodies breathing. Should we meet the many voices that are still circling around in our heads, panicking that we may soon be left behind, we can just notice them and softly leave them be.
It is not easy. Given our human nature, we are creatures of habit and creatures that can get addicted to adrenaline. It is not easy, but, especially at this day and age, especially as we are most beautifully and frustratingly human, we must, as one of my favourite poets David Whyte would say:
“Go against yourself.”
Contemplations
:
What is your body and your mind telling you right now?
Are they different messages or do they align?
Where is the place within that you know you should go?
How can you go to this place and cultivate some rest?
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