Spoiler Alert: You may have heard this before. Or if you haven’t read it explicitly, you have the concept of it moving around in the shadows of your mind, tugging at you and reminding you. You’re tired, after all. Physically, maybe. Emotionally, most likely. Mentally, absolutely. At some level you know how tired you are, and your thoughts won’t let you free of the knowledge. But your willpower won’t let you free to surrender either. You dig your heels in and resist.

Sleep, after all, signifies anything but productivity, anything but motivation, anything but success. Quite to the contrary, fatigue means failure to most of us I’d say. Laziness, neglect, passivity. Succumbing to the desire to rest is weak, and so we press on. Just one more hour, day, week, and year. We’ll rest later, when life slows down.

Right?

Well, obviously I’m here to tell you to throw all that negative justification crap over your left shoulder. Seriously, life isn’t ever going to slow down. Unless you take the reigns, guide that dangerously-driven horse and chariot of yours over to the rails, and intentionally take yourself out of the race. Not forever, just for long enough to refuel, regain focus, and remember where you were headed in the first place. And next time you feel like you’re being chased down by your own tendency to bull haphazardly through the stress, the kids, the marriage, the job, make it a point to rest again. You can choose your course of action. And the path you take matters. I implore you to slow your own life down. Rest your body, your brain, and your heart.

But what do I mean by rest? Here’s a short anecdote for your reading pleasure. It was Monday. My husband and I had been irresponsible the night before. You see, we are new Game of Thrones groupies, and we watched one too many episodes. Living on the edge, I know. So anyhow, instead of sleeping between the hours of 10pm and 6am like I always envision myself doing in my perfect life, I slept between the hours of 1am and 9am. So what right? I still got 8 hours of sleep, so what am I complaining about? Well, apparently my body prefers the window of the former over the window of the latter.

My sister brought her two kids over, aged four and two. I already had my three at the house with me (where else would they be?). This left me with five children under the age of five for the next three hours. We did a sticker craft, I gave them snacks. I was a horse, and a dragon, and a lion, and a mountain. They spit water at one another, they stole cars from one another, they chased one another into couches and chairs and sliding glass doors. I opened three pieces of mail that ended up in a crinkled wet mess on the floor instead of in their appropriate to-do piles. I drank coffee and ate a protein bar and probably some chocolate. Definitely some chocolate. Scrolled through Face Book and posted some pictures and found a recipe I fancied myself making for lunch. They cried and I wiped away their tears. They laughed and I laughed right along with them.

And then my sister came back and whisked her kids out the door and it was time for lunch (not the recipe referred to moments ago), milk, and naps. I had maybe two hours to myself. And oh, how I needed to clean my house! Dirty floors, dirty dishes, dirty laundry, dirty playroom. Need I go on? Disorganization was pulling me in any direction but one. And what about my work out? I needed to keep up on my exercise. And my business! I should write a blog post and add journal pages to my book and figure out how to sign up for affiliate links. Plus the family budget. And dinner. And I needed to eat right now by the way, or my body might think I’m starving to death and my metabolism will slow down and the next time I eat it’ll all just turn to fat stores. What the hell should I do first, not to mention after first?!?!

Well, I went to my bedroom. I kicked off my shoes. I crawled into bed, pulled the sheets up over my shoulders, and closed my eyes. It was quiet, so quiet. I could hear the house creak. My curtains were letting in little rays of sunlight, just enough to bring out the dark of the room. I focused on my breathing. I attended to the air passing through my nose and filling up my lungs. I felt my bare feet heavy against the mattress. I let my head sink into the coolness of the pillow. And I did…… nothing. No thoughts, no memories, no planning, just the grounding of the moment.

I’ve done this before, in fact I do it whenever I’m compelled to do so. I’m usually able to drop into this state of rest faster than I used to. Letting go of the expectations I have on myself. Forgetting all the reasons why I might be tired, refusing to justify my need to stop or to entertain ideas about how I could do better next time. Having faith in the knowing that I will get up when I’m ready, without force or fight. Allowing patience and peace to fall over my body, my mind, and my heart.

Sometimes I actually sleep, sometimes I do not. Today I drifted off for maybe 20 minutes. The dogs woke me when my older daughter came home from school. I laid there for another 10 minutes, doing……. nothing. And then, a thought popped into my head. Hot tea. Yes, I want that.

So up I got, down to the kitchen I went. Hot tea brewing, I’d like to get the dishes done. And the counter tops go along with that. With a clean kitchen and freshly steeped tea, I move into the office to work the budget and make a reminder for myself about this very topic for a future blog post. My son arrives home and I ask him to sweep the floors while I clean and vacuum the playroom. Feels good to move. Up and down as I pick up toys and put them back to where they belong.

My Littles wake up to a clean kitchen and a clean playroom. I don’t have to worry about them getting hurt on a bunch of random shit. So I start dinner. The recipe I found earlier comes in handy. Off we go to pick my daughter up from gymnastics. Back home for family meal and bedtime. I got so much done today I have a hard time believing the reality of it all.

And how did I manage? I refuse to bull through, that’s how. I rest first. And I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that if I give myself those moments, I will thrive. In fact, resting is thriving. I believe it’s the smartest thing we can do for ourselves. You won’t get lazy, you won’t fall off the edge of productivity, you won’t fail at life. You will become more tolerant, more confident, more alert, and more forgiving.

And do this for no one but yourself by the way. Pay yourself first, in other words. Don’t do it for anyone else. No one else cares enough to force you to take a deep breath for the sake of breathing. In fact, most people would probably not understand, or even approve, of this new little habit of yours. But do it anyways. You know who will benefit in the end? Well, you of course. But your spouse, your kids, your coworkers, and your friends, will all come around to appreciating your example. Why? Because you are giving them permission to do the same. And everyone needs more rest, everyone.

If you juggle a full-time job, if you juggle three part-time jobs, if you work the night-shift, even if you juggle every aspect of your life besides a job, you can and should find time to sleep first. Call it a recharge, call it a refresh, call it your happy place, but give yourself this gift. Over time, looking back, you will see just how much more productive, creative, healthy, and energized you’ve become.

I’d love to hear your take on this concept! Whether you’ve been taking steps in this direction for years, or if you’re having trouble taking this leap of faith onto the other side of crazy busy, let’s take a deep breath into the moment, for the sake of the moment, and experience what it can do for all of us on the daily….

Thanks for reading ~ take care of YOU!