Five Ways to Deepen into Rest

Photo credit: Annie Spratt on Unsplash

A month ago I wrote and published a blog entitled ‘Embracing Rest’.

Since that time I’ve been noticing and tracking my experience with resting, which truthfully could better be described as ‘wrestling rest’ than embracing it!

‘Old habits die hard’, as the saying goes and I’ve been discovering how deeply ingrained my habits of busy-ness, distraction and addiction to checking electronic media really are. I wonder if it may be similar for you?

What’s so difficult about rest?

Stillness, silence, and simply being aren’t valued much in modern human society and are unlikely to have been encouraged in your family upbringing, education or workplace.

As I suggested in my previous post on this subject, productivity, with its focus on grades, aims, targets, outputs and outcomes is what many of us have been trained for. It’s all about doing, achieving and succeeding. And it’s rarely about doing so in a joyful, playful, relaxed or restful way

Something else I’ve noticed is the intense discomfort that too much nothingness, spaciousness, or emptiness can bring up in my nervous system. I really struggle to sit still and just be, not only because of the endless chatter of my monkey mind but also due to a palpable physical restlessness.