You Programme Rest Days For Your Muscles. Why Not For You?
There's always something else.
The washing. The school whatsapp group. The emails. The thing you said you'd sort before the week started. The mental list that never quite empties.
And even when you do sit down, you're still scrolling. Still planning tomorrow. Still unconsciously assessing, are my clothes enough, are the kids eating a well balanced diet, should I be taking collagen… the list goes on. Still half present in seventeen different places at once.
We don't really know how to rest anymore. And I don't think that's an accident.
Women especially are carrying something that never gets put down. Not just the physical jobs, the cleaning, the cooking, the logistics, but the invisible ones. The remembering, the anticipating, the emotional work of keeping everything and everyone okay. Even women without children carry it. The expectation that you should be everything, all the time, to everyone around you.
And somewhere in the middle of all of that, you're supposed to also be working on yourself. Getting fitter. Being healthier. Showing up fully.
It's exhausting just writing it. If your best friend said that last bit to you you’d say “babe, you need to rest, it’s not all on you” yet do we allow that sentiment to ourselves.
Here's something I think about a lot.
In strength training, rest isn't optional. That's the point. When you lift weights, you create tiny tears in your muscle fibres. The rest period, programmed between sets, between sessions, is when your body repairs those tears and comes back stronger. Skip the rest and you don't get stronger. You get injured. You burn out. You stop.
So why do we understand this so clearly in the gym, and completely ignore it in the rest of our lives?
You cannot keep going and going, physically, mentally, emotionally, and expect everything to turn out fine. Something will give. It always does. And usually it's you.
Rest isn't the opposite of productivity. It's what makes productivity possible.
You don’t need a full day to yourself, although that's wonderful when it happens. Just permission to stop. To sit outside for ten minutes and listen to the birds without your phone. To go on a walk not because you need the steps but because you feel better after. To do a strength workout not to burn anything off but because you know you'll feel more capable, more settled, more like yourself when it's done.
The guilt you feel when you rest? That's not your instinct. That's conditioning. Someone taught you that your worth is measured in your output. And it's making you tired in a way that sleep doesn't fix.
A few things worth sitting with:
When did you last stop, with the phone a long way away, and not feel like you should be doing something else?
What would it feel like to rest without earning it first?
Is the tiredness you're carrying physical, or is it something heavier than that?
If any of this resonated, you might find it helpful to know that this is exactly the kind of thing we work through together. Not just the movement, but everything around it. You can find out more about working with me here.