Putting rest into our lives

An approach to support rest

You may well have noticed that rest is not easy, nor is it a quick hack. It is not separate to other things we do, and if you live with fatigue, rest may have taken on a new importance as it enables you to do what is important and connect with who and what you love.

Mindfulness can support this process of finding a way to stop and feel deeply nurturing. It can also show us how and where we struggle.

Mindfulness allows us to cultivate other qualities that support our understanding and the actions we take- insight and compassion.

Insight

Stopping, pausing, resting gives rise to a space where wisdom can develop. In the pause and the reflection, we can sometimes witness habitual mind and body patterns (e.g. when I stand up I grit my teeth; I must rest away from everyone else and not be in the way; I can only rest when the house is tidy), and question whether this is helpful for us at this point. In doing this, we can then create more helpful contexts for our ability to rest, realise when we are collapsing rather than resting and use other ways to manage this.

 

Compassion

This process of allowing ourselves to stop, to kindly witness our experience and open up to alternative ways of doing things is an act of compassion for ourselves, but often people start to realise that the more they are taking care of themselves the more available they can be to others. Letting ourselves see what is happening, our habits and instincts (both useful and not so helpful), can be either appreciated or forgiven, and from that perhaps other possibilities open out as we are ready to step back into giving and receiving in the wider world.