Today, I’m getting real about rest. I’m sharing how I’m dealing with illness and listening to my body, which is something that I haven’t always been good at.
Another Turkey Day is officially in the books. It was a lovely few days spent with my crazy, awesome family and I feel so, so grateful. I got to see my best friends from high school, spend time in Philly with my extended family, pick out a Christmas tree with my parents and siblings and tour the Baltimore Christmas Village with my parents and boyfriend. It was filled with lots of travel, tons of food and maybe a few many too cocktails. As awesome as these past few days were, all the craziness has caught up to me. I have a terribly sore throat and am bogged down with exhaustion. On Monday, I went to bed at 8:30 p.m. — I don’t think I’ve gone to bed that early since the third grade. I was so upset when I woke up that morning feeling sick. I thought, “why now?!” After a few days of being off my workout/yoga routine and eating all the food, I was looking forward to jumping back into my routine. But so it goes, my body had other plans for me.
After lots of running around, not eating enough veggies, getting enough exercise or sleep my body was like, “Yo!! Listen to me.” And so I got sick. Now, by no means am I advocating for saying no to the delicious food or forcing yourself to workout and skip out on fun family activities — sometimes our bodies are just trying to tell us to slow down. It happens and is totally normal. Like just about everyone else, I hate getting sick. It ruins my carefully thought out plans and routine, messes up my workouts/zen time and forces me to be still. Sometimes I love and cherish days spent doing nothing and watching movies, but this week was not one of those weeks — I had a routine to get back into! Similar to many others’ experiences, choosing to rest and listen to my body is difficult. I’m sure that my Type-A folks can relate — it’s challenging to adjust to something you didn’t have in your scope of plans.
My adverse reaction to rest got me thinking, why am I so against taking time to chill out? Yoga Girl Rachel Brathen discussed rest on a podcast I listened to yesterday and it really resonated with me. She shared that she feels like she needs to “earn” her rest and I really relate to that. I feel okay with resting after a successful work week when I did lots of yoga and workouts and ate healthy or if I accomplished something big. However, taking time to rest when I feel that I haven’t done anything deserving of it feels challenging. When I woke up and knew I needed to say no to the gym and sleep longer, my first thought was “but you didn’t earn it.” Ugh, Morgan!! My mind immediately went to my lack of physical activity the last few days and all the food I ate and I was so annoyed at the timing of my sickness. Rest is just rest — this I know is true. Resting does not make us a lesser person, it is not something that must be earned through work output or proven accomplishment, it’s something that our bodies, and our souls, genuinely need. I know all of this but it still doesn’t mean taking time to slow down and be gentle with ourselves is easy.
Our bodies know way more than the ideas we form in our minds. If our bodies tell us to rest, it shouldn’t be something we “schedule” for later in the week at a more convenient time or for after a big win. We can (and should) rest, miss a workout, binge on Netflix, go to bed two hours early because we feel it in our bones that it’s what our bodies need. That workout will be there in a few days and so will the to-do list. There have been too many times that I still went to the gym or attended a social outing even though I felt sick and weak, and all I that I got out of it was getting more sick. Our bodies do so much for us and they need time to restore and rejuvenate. Rest does not make you weak it makes you strong. It takes courage to listen to your body, to tune out to what everyone on social media is doing and to drop the feeling of “not enough.” You are enough — you always have been and no amount of exercise or work will make you more worthy than you already are.
Today, I came upon this quote from Shauna Niequist, “Being present over perfect is about rejecting the myth that every day is a new opportunity to prove our worth, and about the truth that our worth is inherent, given by God, not earned by our hustling.” Lord knows I needed to hear it today, and I truly believe these messages cross our paths for a reason. So today and these next few days, I’m taking it easy. My head may say hot yoga but my body says bed and Hallmark movies so I’m listening. I’m choosing rest over going harder, faster, stronger because I know it’s not only what I need but what I deserve. I’m learning to tune out the “should be’s” and tuning into what my body asks of me.
Sending you lots of light and love. Please don’t forget to slow down when you need to…and just because you want to. 🙂