Working in the innovation space, and having a husband in tech, means I hear a lot about optimization. I am surrounded by people intent on maximizing themselves, their environments, their workflows. Even among my personal relationships, a significant percentage of my friends work for an e-commerce giant that has an office in town which has spent the last decade cranking up the efficiencies of every process to the point that it feels like products arrive at your house the moment it crosses your mind to order them. 

There is an obsession with production, sequencing, timelines, in wringing value out of every moment. And that all makes sense, it feels like we never have enough time, enough resources, enough energy, so we think that just to keep up we have to be faster, better, smarter. I get push ads for services that promise to teach me the fundamental concepts of important books in 15 minute audio summaries, because who has time to read? Its addictive to think we could have everything we wanted if we just tried a little harder. 

As I talked about in the blog a few months ago, I’ve been on an intentional pursuit of margin lately, and it has been beautiful. I made a bargain with myself that I could get back to hustling in Fall, but that I could take a few months where I could focus on those things that felt like actual life, that I could take a season where I didn’t have to justify myself so much. I’ve spent time working and caring for my children, but I also have spent time connecting with loved ones, planning a weekend away for a group of families, setting up my kids’ playroom with pretty vinyl wallpaper, training for a couple races, and writing pages and pages and pages about whatever was on my mind. And all of it was not out of compulsion or responsibility but simply for the joy of doing so. I’m going to be covering some of the ideas that have really made a difference in this season, primarily around self-care, as we head towards the busyness of fall. 

Here’s one of the main things I’ve learned: the only cure for tiredness is rest. That sounds painfully obvious, but it bears saying because of how desperately we try to believe it isn’t true. When we feel exhausted by our work, our responsibilities, or by the world, we try to do anything but rest. We re-organize and optimize, we chug coffee and try cold plunges, we buy new planners, and try new apps, and bully ourselves. When we find that its 2pm on a weekday and we should be getting something done but instead we’ve spent the last 90 minutes alternating between scrolling, shopping, and staring out the window, we blame ourselves, and try to force ourselves back into our work. We wear blue-light glasses and noise canceling headphones and think if we just have the right tools we will be unstoppable.

What if you were unable to focus at 2pm on weekday because you’re tired? What if the only cure for tiredness is rest? Rest can look like a lot of things, but what it never looks like is doubling down on the thing that caused the tiredness in the first place. 

Someone the other day was telling me that he was going to get some bloodwork done because he thought he might be seriously ill – he kept falling asleep on the couch at 7:30pm and would sleep through the night. He thought there must be something wrong for him to need that much sleep. I asked about the rest of his routines, and he told me that he gets up at 5am every day to exercise and then helps with the kids from 6-7am and then runs a multimillion dollar company form 7am-5pm and then jumps back in with his family from 5pm until the kids go to bed at 7pm and then by 7:30pm, he falls asleep. I looked at him with all the empathy in the world for a man doing his best to build a good life for his family, and said, “do you think you’re maybe just tired?” 

We talked about him setting aside mid-day dates with his wife while the kids were at daycare so they could have time together, we talked about off-loading some of the admin work of the business, even if it meant cutting into profit margins, so that he could start work a little later, or end a little earlier. We talked about finding an exercise routine that suited his goals and also allowed him to wake up at a time more suited for his body clock. We didn’t talk at all about him just trying harder to stay awake, or trying a new schedule to shove it all in tighter. We trusted that if he was tired, what he needed was rest. 

If you are struggling to make it through a work day productively, especially on top of additional responsibilities like childcare, elder care, or managing medical issues, what you don’t need is more systems, or more coffee, or to push harder. What you probably need is more rest. 

Last week, I talked about Dr. Rigby’s exhortation to “try to win” – to dig within ourselves to not give up the work that we’re called to, even when it seems like we’re fighting uphill. Consider this a continuation of that thought. When we drag ourselves through our days, trying to wring the last little juice out of our drained mental, physical, and emotional batteries, we aren’t trying to win  – we’re trying to survive. As I highlighted in that post – true hope, truly committing to the work, can (and often does) look like giving ourselves enough rest to be able to bring our full selves to the task. 

We are going to be continuing to dig into ideas of resting, caring for ourselves, and creating adequate space for the Spirit to move in us over the next few weeks. For now, take this with you: You probably need more rest. Real rest. And if it seems like all you can do is rest, then it means you probably need even more rest. Give it a try, and we’d love to hear how it goes.