Why is it so HARD to rest?
Rest Isn’t Easy For Me. Maybe It Isn’t For You Either.
“Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes… including you.” Anne Lamott
I’ve learned something uncomfortable about myself recently: Even when my body gives me absolutely no choice but to rest, actually resting is still hard for me. Recovering from a hip replacement should have made rest simple. It should have been obvious. My body wasn’t asking politely, it was demanding it. And yet, I still found myself inching toward rest instead of receiving it.
And that delay… that inner hesitation… It showed me something. I still have work to do here.
Why Is Rest So Hard, Even When We Need It Most?
As I laid there healing, unable to push past anything, literally, the questions started surfacing:
Is it because I have control issues? Is it trust? Is it not wanting to let people down? Is it wanting to feel needed? Is it the pressure to make things easier for everyone once I’m back? Or is it something even deeper?
The truth is: It’s not resistance, it’s wiring. It’s not refusal, it’s conditioning. It’s not weakness, it’s habit.
And I’m far from alone.
Nearly half of Americans say they rarely unplug from work even during downtime. And neuroscientists say our brains can become so accustomed to stimulation that actual rest feels awkward, even unsafe at first.
So no, it’s not “just me.” It’s all of us who tend to push, lead, serve, or hold a lot.
The Most Rested I Felt… Was the Day I Shut Everything Off
Here’s the moment that stopped me. The day of my surgery, I gave my phone to my wife for over 24 hours. No email. No texts. No checking in. No notifications. Nothing.
I was literally unavailable. And in reflection, that was the most rested I felt the entire week.
Not because the day was easy, it wasn’t. Not because I was comfortable, definitely not that. But because I had fully unplugged.
For the first time in a long time, the world couldn’t reach me. And even more surprising, I didn’t feel guilty. I felt free. It turns out silence isn’t empty. It’s restorative. Research backs this up too:
• Turning off notifications for 24 hours can reduce stress by nearly 30%.
• Extended screen breaks boost mental clarity by up to 40%.
• Quiet, device-free time acts as a “neural reset,” something sleep alone can’t give us.
I didn’t intend to run an experiment, but my surgery ended up running one on me.
The Seven Types of Rest (And the One I Needed Most)
Years ago, I learned something that changed how I think about rest, and I’ve taught it ever since. There isn’t just one kind of rest. There are seven.
And if even one type is depleted, the whole system feels it. Here they are again, the seven I come back to:
1. Physical Rest Actual body recovery: sleep, stretching, healing, movement that restores instead of strains. Hip replacement? Yeah… my body was waving a giant flag for this one.
2. Mental Rest Quieting the brain that’s always calculating, planning, scanning. This is the rest I delay most.
3. Emotional Rest Permission to stop performing, pleasing, managing everyone’s expectations.
4. Social Rest Time away from noise, conversation, or being “on,” even for the people you love.
5. Sensory Rest Stepping away from screens, alerts, lights, stimulation, the things we forget are draining us.
6. Creative Rest Inspiration breaks. Wonder breaks. Time to refill instead of produce.
7. Spiritual Rest Meaning. Connection. Being grounded in something bigger than your to-do list. This week, I wasn’t lacking physical rest. My body had no choice. What I was missing? Mental rest. Emotional rest. Spiritual rest. And those don’t happen just because you stop moving. They happen when you stop carrying.
What This Season Is Teaching Me (Slowly, but deeply)
1. My body knows first. My heart catches up last. And that gap matters.
2. Rest is not a break from responsibility — it’s part of responsibility. Especially if I want to lead and love well.
3. Unplugging isn’t indulgent — it’s essential. Almost no meaningful rest happens with a phone in hand.
4. Trust might be the real work. Trust that things can survive without me. Trust that I don’t have to be everywhere. Trust that healing needs space.
5. I want to learn to rest before I’m forced to. Because rest shouldn’t require a crisis or a surgery to feel permission.
If You’re Anything Like Me…
You might delay rest because you care. Because you want to show up well. Because you want to help people. Because you want to carry your share, and maybe a little extra.
But rest is not the enemy of responsibility. It’s the foundation of it.
And when we finally allow ourselves to stop, unplug, breathe, and receive the kind of rest we actually need…
We don’t become less dependable. We become more human.
Because the time it takes us to arrive at rest? That’s part of the healing too.
#BeingHumanKind #Rest #Healing #HipReplacementJourney #SevenTypesOfRest #Stillness #Leadership #HumanFirst #UnplugToRecharge #EmotionalHealth #TrustTheProcess #PersonalGrowth #LeadWithHeart #LifeKerning
