Your relationship with rest can reveal a lot about your childhood conditioning.
(It also reveals a lot about our societal conditioning but that’s for some other time.)
I’ve been needing a lot more rest lately.
Needing rest sometimes brings up old stuff for me.
You see, I was diagnosed with a rare chronic illness in 2012, and for 4 years before that, I had no idea why my body was falling part. It was chaotic.
A few years of denial and a long dark night of the soul after, I finally made peace with my body and learned to accept its day to day limitations. I could barely function back then.
I had to grieve the old Manasi. The one I knew for so long. I had to leave a lot of things behind. Including what defined me as a person. Or so I thought.
I was conditioned to believe that if I rested, I was being unproductive. So I did more to be seen.
I was always a sickly child, but I was extremely ambitious about “making it” and prided myself in being a workaholic and a perfectionist. Much like my dad.
It took my body’s falling apart for me to realise that it was OKAY to rest. That needing rest wasn’t a sign of weakness.
The wounded inner child believed she was unworthy if she didn’t do enough. Unfortunately, “enough” was never enough for anyone.
The inner wise woman has always known better. She knows I’m worthy even if I need more rest than others. She knows that knowing when to rest and honouring my reality (chronic illness) is wise.
After so many years of embracing my illness, the inner wise woman stands tall in her truth and knows how to soothe the wounded inner child.
Please don’t deny yourself of the rest you need. It’s a very essential part of any healing process. There is profound wisdom and strength in letting yourself rest.
Rest is sacred. So please treat it as that.
Let’s not glorify busy and productivity as if they’re some golden standards for success.
They’re not. Those old standards, structures, and system are no longer working. It’s all crumbling and we must allow the new to form by letting the old go.
Your enough-ness does not decrease with needing more rest. If anything, you become more enough than you’ve ever been because you are in tune with the wisdom of your body.
What’s your conditioning around rest? Where does it come from? Tell me in the comments section below.
Love,
Manasi