Resting Rebel

I’m a do-er, a strive-er, a take action kinda gal. Hearing a challenge turns me into a toddler who has just been instructed not to do something, and so wants to do that thing with every fibre of her being. I’m also learning that doing less and resting have some magic to share with me.

Doing things the hard way

Until recently I didn’t know I was choosing to do things the hard way, I thought it was just the way. Here’s one example…

I completed a PhD, which, even under ideal circumstances, is a gauntlet of intellectual, emotional, financial, and sometimes physical challenges. It’s hard.

On top of the baked-in demands, the specifics of the program of study I chose, were, over-the-top challenging.

I chose An academic teaching and mentorship system that I was warned might not support me in all the ways I needed or deserved.

I chose to conduct my research in a country halfway around the planet, in a region that spoke a dialect I didn’t know. The language was also undocumented, so I couldn’t just easily take a class.

I chose to study an animal that is most visible at night and lives underwater. So I went out SCUBA diving and fishing at night in search of my possibly endangered seahorses. I didn’t get much sleep for months on end.

When I reflect back on it, it’s almost like I was building an obstacle course for myself. Like I was testing to see just how challenging I could make ‘PhDing’. I now scratch my head and wonder, ‘Why the hell did I put up with all that?’. It certainly was a period of intense learning for me. I walked away a published author, able to fund my research. I sometimes joke that my degree should say something like ‘professional problem solver’. But did it have to be so hard? So punishing?

I survived my PhD, but I wouldn’t say I thrived. My body was a wreck by the end. During field work I lost a bunch of weight. I got Dengue Fever. My digestive issues worsened. And once I returned from doing field research, I was such a work-a-holic stress case while writing my dissertation that I almost alienated my boyfriend (who later became my husband). Thankfully, he called me on my shit and we recovered.

It was my husband, Steph, who first, lovingly pointed out to me that I have a tendency to do things the hard way – and wow did I hate it! I would get very defensive. I’d think, ‘That’s not me, I don’t do that!’ and come up with justifications that had to do with loving adventure and being an empowered woman. I’d always just been really disciplined and hard working, I thought.

Does it always have to be hard?

As I became a parent, doing things the hard way became too hard. The wake up call came when my kids were 2 and 4 years old. I ended up in an Emergency Room, unable to breathe. A third round of strep throat for the year had swollen my throat closed.

My ER visit was a sobering event that made me realize the toll my choices were taking on me. I wanted to do all the things. During the day, I wanted to revel in the precious time I had with my babies while they were young. In the evenings, I wanted to work on something that felt meaningful and engaged my academic mind. Somewhere in there I wanted to be silly and adventurous with my husband and friends. I wanted to throw my whole self into this phase of my life like I had thrown all my energy into my PhD! But, my body was clearly exhausted. I couldn’t do it all, and I felt like a failure.

That crash of my physical (and emotional) health led me into a phase of self reflection and practicing asking for help. Steph and I are a loving team. We parent together, support each other’s aspirations outside our household, and communicate early and often. Even with all this team work, we ended up choosing a family routine that was out of balance. This was a challenging and messy time for us. It still brings up feelings of ‘I’m doing my best, and it isn’t enough’. It’s hard to write about.

To move forward, we had to make changes. Steph changed his work schedule. We hired extra child care. I started seeing a psychiatrist and then later took a leadership course to guide my decisions about work. These investments we made in my health allowed me to rest and recover. Then I got curious about alternatives to doing things the hard way.

Noticing as a way forward

The most powerful skill I’ve learned from this phase in my life is to notice my thoughts and feelings. That’s it! Just to observe – not to change or fix anything.

For me, the power is in the pause that stopping to notice brings. In that pause, I transform into the Scientist, the observer. Rather than resist Steph’s observation, I get to be curious.

I think, “Huh, am I doing that? What does that feel like? I wonder what that’s about?”.

I love this observation part of science! And it feels like I’ve left a door open, juuuuust a crack – just enough to be an invitation that may lead somewhere different.

Softening my resistance to rest

As I was in this open door phase of noticing, there were a couple things I learned about myself that began to soften my resistance to rest. I learned that I’m a product of a society that demonizes rest and that I am an introvert.

Conditioned to favour busyness

How often is the answer to “How are you?” something along the lines of, “Oh, I’m so busy!” Or, “I’m really tired. Life is crazy right now!”

Always!

And when was the last time you heard someone say, “I’m feeling so rested/rejuvenated.” when you ask how they are?

Right. Crickets. Because never.

It turns out that here in North America (and elsewhere, too), we live in a soup of busy-ness being applauded. We’re hooked on activity and stimulation. We struggle to say no. We wear our busy like a badge of honor. And because we value busy so highly, we de-value rest and doing less. I’ve definitely noticed myself engaging in this twisted kind of bragging. I feel like I’m more, or better if I can show how much I’m doing. Hmmmm, interesting – do I feel like my value is linked to my productivity?

Learning that aiming for busy wasn’t necessarily my idea, helps me. It helps me understand where my drive to work so hard, to hold on so tightly that my knuckles turned white, may have come from. It also makes it easier to give myself permission to opt out of being busy.

Introvert = Professional Permission to Rest

Learning that I’m an introvert has also softened my resistance to rest. My psychiatrist had me take a test to assess where I fit on the spectrum from introvert to extrovert. I always assumed I was an extrovert because I love performing and chatting with people. So I was surprised when the test result put me closer to the introverted end of the spectrum.

I also felt a huge relief – like I’d been given permission to give my body what it needed. Introverts need time to recover after prolonged periods in large crowds or multi-tasking. It was like I now had an excuse, a card that was a free pass to rest that I could hold up to the voice in my head that called me lazy.

Experiments in rest and doing less

About a year after my ER strep throat visit, I went through a phase of feeling exhausted again. My kids are curious creatures who have lots of questions and are still young so need help doing daily tasks. I do a lot of multi-tasking, all day long. And I now know that introverts tend to feel drained by multi-tasking.

I used to run for a sugar hit in the afternoon to get me through the day, and still I was grumpy. I was grumpy because my brain needed a rest and double grumpy because I felt that I shouldn’t need a rest. That little voice in my head would say, ‘Rest? That’s weak! You should be able to handle being with your kids all day long!’ or ‘You’ve done plenty of hard things, this should be easy!’

That word, should – it’s such an asshole! It’s a cruel voice belittling me at my weak moments. We teach our children to listen to their bodies and to ask for what they need, and yet I have a should in my head that shames me for doing those very things!

When should pops up, it’s becoming a reminder to me to pause, and be curious.

The introvert in me clearly needs some down time. So how can I make that happen, even on days when I am with my kiddos all day?

Time for this scientist to do some experiments…

Experiment #1 – Can a 40 year old nap, while parenting?

My 5 and 7 year olds have an hour of quiet time after lunch each day. We’ve kept this hold-over from when they were toddlers, and still napped, as a daily rest for us all. Sometimes instead of resting, though, I tidy up, prepare dinner, or even just look at my phone. None of those activities feel restful. So I decided to try an experiment where I actually rest while my kids rest.

One day when I hadn’t slept very well the previous night, I laid down on the couch and fell asleep. I, the adult, had an afternoon nap while my kids listened to audiobooks in their rooms. Whoa!

Another day, during kid quiet time, I sipped tea and stared out the window. It was spring and there were lots of birds flying by. My brain resisted resting by making to-do lists and planning out this or that. It questioned whether this was the right way to rest (I kid you not! The perfectionism force is strong in my brain.) And I just let it. My body was resting, and that was a good enough start for me.

These tiny acts of rest made me feel a bit like a rebel. I felt sneaky and awesome. Giving my body the rest it was asking for felt deeply nourishing.

Experiment #2 – How can everyone get what they need?

Sometimes I get it in my head that I can’t get what I need, while also taking care of my kids. It makes me sad because it pits what’s good for me against what’s good for my kids. It’s crude, and mostly not true, but it certainly feels true sometimes. In talking about it with my leadership coach, Tanis, she challenged me to try an experiment: What if both mom and kids can get what we need? How could it be possible? Tanis invited me to keep my eyes open for opportunities.

One morning I woke up with stiff muscles. I had a day of taking care of kiddos ahead of me. It was also during 2020, so there were extra layers of stress and anxiety. Preparing breakfast I was grumpy. I desperately wanted to sprawl out on the living room rug and stretch and roll on some massage balls I really love. That is what my body was calling for. But, I grumbled internally that I couldn’t do that for me because I had to clean up the kitchen, play with the kids, etc.

So when both kids went to their rooms to play independently it felt like a window opening. Kids are occupied, can I go stretch? OOoooooo, let’s try it and see! I immediately stopped washing the dishes, grabbed my massage balls, and hit the living room rug. I still wasn’t convinced this would work, though. I thought, ‘Surely, as soon as I lie down the kids will need me for something.’

But as 10 and then 20 minutes of stretching and massaging went by, the kids were still happily entertaining themselves. It was a miracle! My body started feeling looser and calmer. I was feeling relieved!

Inside, I was doing a little happy dance in celebration of the fact that I can actually, sometimes, get me what I need, while parenting. What a revelation!

Results – Rest/less is more

Going into these experiments I had fears.

Fear:

If I rest, others will think I’m lazy (or worse, a bad mother).

Fear:

If I do less, things will fall apart. I picture a screaming-hungry-children-no-food-in-the-fridge kind of catastrophe.

Fear:

If I do less, I will fail because success has always come when I have worked my tail off.

To my delight, my experiments myth-busted these fears. Resting resulted in me feeling rejuvenated and there was zero lazy-heckling. Doing less resulted in our world continuing to turn. Sure, the dishes got done much later (by my hubby) and dinner may have been less elaborate than I intended, but everyone was alive and happy. Instead of failure, I experienced some joy! I felt lighter and had more patience and silliness to share with my family.

Holding a baby bunny replaces doing things the hard way

These experiments made me realize that I don’t have to carry it all. I don’t have to hold all the tiny ends of all the projects together. I don’t have to follow up on them so closely. I don’t have to hold it all so tightly that my knuckles turn white.

Instead of doing things the hard way, I’m starting to see another way. The image of holding a baby bunny comes to my mind. My daughter came home one day describing her visit to a petting zoo. Her favourite part was when she got to hold a baby bunny. It was tiny, soft, and vulnerable. She was instructed to hold it firmly, but gently: enough to keep the bunny from falling out of her hands, but not so much that she squished it.

It dawned on me that this is what I’m aiming for: I want to hold my projects (parenting, relationships, work, building a house, etc.) as if they are baby bunnies.

I want to move away from squeezing so tightly that my knuckles turn white, and my hands cramp and I smother the breath, life, and fun out of things. This approach exhausts and isolates me and I wonder what magic it shuts out.

I want to move towards a more spacious and trusting grasp, where my hands are relaxed and nimble enough to roll with whatever comes. This approach nourishes me. It allows for a community of support around me. It allows for creativity and fun.

Rest and doing less are a practice I am tending to. Doing all the things is still my default setting and I’m learning to balance that with embracing rest. I’m learning to notice when my body needs rest and acknowledge the voices in my head that berate me for being weak to even consider resting. Instead I try to get curious about the magic, joy, silliness, or calm that become possible with rest. Do I still sometimes feel icky at the end of the day, and stay up too late watching Netflix? Of course I do.

Unexpectedly, I felt a bit like a badass while trying some resting experiments. Going against the busy grain really lit up my inner rebel spirit! I’m going to use that to help me make things feel fun that might otherwise be too scary to try.

I’m going to continue experimenting with being a Resting Rebel!

Resources on Rest

If you’re interested in stories of others who are exploring rest and doing less and the history and science behind it all, check these out:

Why you need more rest with Claudia Hammond – Feel Better, Live Better with Dr. Rangan Chatterjee – British family doctor interviews Professor Claudia Hammond https://claudiahammond.com about her research on rest and it’s take home messages for all of us, including steps we can take to introduce more rest into our lives.

32 is the new 40 – Outside/In – Public radio producer, Jimmy Gutierrez, looks into the history of work culture and where it’s being challenged. He tries to implement a 32 hour work week in his own workplace.

How ‘Wintering’ Replenishes with Katherine May – On Being with Krista Tippett – I am so inspired by Katherine May’s journey. She describes how, with experience, she learned to welcome a season of needed rest (what she refers to as winter). May writes;

“When I started to feel the drag of winter, I began to treat myself like a favored child with kindness and love. I assumed my needs were reasonable and that my feelings were signals of something important. I kept myself well fed and I made sure I was getting enough sleep. I took myself for walks in the fresh air and spent time doing things that soothed me. I asked myself, ‘What is this winter all about?’ I asked myself, ‘What change is coming?’”

I deeply admire how she has learned to trust herself. She welcomed rest with open arms and then became curious about what wisdom it has to share.