It’s been a chaotic week, a long day, or you simply just want five minutes of rest. You open TikTok and start scrolling, only to be met with videos titled “productive 5am morning routine”, “my 5-9 after my 9-5” and “how I get my life together every morning”. Suddenly, your five minutes of doing absolutely nothing feels like something you should feel guilty about.
We are constantly surrounded by content that makes productivity look like a lifestyle rather than something we simply do. There is always another workout to complete, book to read, application to submit, or habit to build. Even our downtime has become something to optimise.
It can make resting feel like you are falling behind, and it becomes very easy to compare your own life against someone else’s, forgetting that you do not see the moments when they do absolutely nothing. This has created a sense of having to earn rest. We tell ourselves that we can relax once we have finished everything on our to-do list, not realising that there will always be something else to do. If we only allow ourselves to rest after everything is done, we might never actually reach a state of relaxation. Rest can sometimes feel uncomfortable when we have become used to constantly doing something else. Once we stop or take a break, our minds can immediately start thinking of everything we could be doing instead.
Maybe we should stop asking ourselves, “What could I be doing right now?” and start asking, “What do I actually need?” Sometimes, the answer can just be five minutes of doing nothing. Rest does not have to be productive. Rest is not a waste of time. It is time that allows you to carry on being your best self after. Sometimes, the most productive thing you can do is to stop trying to be productive.