Re-Imagine How You Rest
Summer Camp Week 1: What if the way we're resting is making us more tired, turning up the ennuie?
It’s Week One of Summer Camp for Beauty Hunters. If you’re joining us now, here’s an intro to what we’re doing. In a nutshell, we’re spending Summer 2024 reimagining R&R, and play. Every Tuesday I’ll provide our week’s theme and activity. Jump in at any time!
Dear Beautiful Friends,
Last weekend I was TIRED, the kind of tired where you feel like you’ve earned the right to nap for hours—OK, days. Fair enough. However, this particular human also happens to spend a lot of the week working solo from her home office. The extrovert and playful engager often goes undernourished and I don’t even realize it!
Making matters worse (MMW, can I make up a new acronym?), I often default to introverted ways when this system loves more stimulating recouping. On this particular Sunday, one voice was telling me to stay home and read and nap, while another was encouraging me to go jump on the trampoline with my grandkids. I was paying attention to these contrasting pulls and pushes because of Summer Camp, and answered the call of the ULTIMATE R&R for my Sunday: jump on that tramp with those kids! It was refreshing, relaxing, and rejuvenating—all of the perfect Rs. The tank went from E to F with each bounce and howl.
Have you ever noticed that the retreating and withdrawing forms of R&R sometimes drain you even more, and make you want to run for the bedcovers even more?
For Week 1, Let’s re-imagine REST
Let’s consider an existence where “rest” might be less ….
… and more:
What if the ultimate “rest” is inviting neighbors to dinner, connecting with an old friend, going to a matinee on a Monday, listening to exactly three songs in the morning before doing anything “important.”
What if Rest = picking up a new sport (race walking, pickleball, handstand-ing, submerging body in water); starting or returning to an arts or craft? How about a moratorium on “shoulds,” or a rest from saying Yes to seeing people out of duty rather than delight? A rest from worrying the world is going to hell in a handbasket?
WEEK 1 PROMPT: Watch how you automatically want to “rest,” and take a short pause, ask yourself two questions:
Is it true that this is what my mind-body system most wants?
Is there another way to rest that might refresh and fill up the tank even more than_______, one that will keep my play endurance going strong?
Test it. No right or wrong answer, just experiment in the great laboratory of life and learning. Next week, we’ll pick one Rest Activity to keep in play for a while. xo
That’s it for Summer Camp kick-off.
Happy “resting” everyone. xo
