I recently stumbled across the book Rest Is Resistance by Tricia Hersey, which focuses on the importance of rest in our hustle-driven culture. The manifesto is mostly geared towards the black, indigenous, and people of color community (BIPOC) and how we need to remember that we need rest too. Tricia puts it best when stating “I come from a legacy of exhaustion”. With this in mind, I began to reflect on how I too was falling prey to the never-ending grind of our society.
Before encountering this book, I often felt a sense of shame for just thinking about resting unless it was a reward after a long day of work. How many of us are guilty of that? Piling our days with a massive to-do lists just to reward ourselves with a break or nap after seven hours of straight labor. It might seem girl boss at first but, at the end of the day, we need to rest. Not doing so can lead to a weak immune system and increase your risk of certain illnesses, among other things.
According to the National Library of Medicine, adults should sleep for more than seven hours each night to experience optimal performance. So I’m sorry to break it to you, but the all-nighter you’re pulling is affecting you in the long run and let’s face it: you stopped retaining any information after 1 am.
Rest is a necessary function of practically everything. Just look at nature; in the winter time, most mammals rest for months to be refreshed for spring. If a bear deserves to take the time it needs for survival, so can we! If there’s one thing that I’ve learned from Hersey’s manifesto is that rest is a birthright and our superpower to liberation. With rest we can reflect, make better decisions, and overall improve our health.
So next time you want to push yourself to the brink because you can squeeze in one last task before the day is done, try to take a breather and give yourself some time to reflect or even sleep. I promise it will be well worth it!