Why is it that during our scheduled hour of “down time,” we feel fidgety with mental to-dos? Or that we feel we need a vacation from our vacation? Despite taking opportunities for rest amid our busy lives, why do some of us struggle with feeling rested?
Rest and nonrest
According to research, the state of rest doesn’t occur from the activity itself, but rather from when there is harmony between our feelings, motivations, and actions. This harmony cultivates calm, confidence, and belonging. By contrast, the state of nonrest is defined by disharmony of our feelings, motivations, and actions, which leads to tension and energy depletion.
We are continuously moving between rest and nonrest. When we feel tense and fatigued, we should take it as a cue to restore harmony.
When rest is unrestful
If a typically “restful” activity isn’t allowing you to relax, consider whether your feelings, motivations, and actions are aligned. Imagine the following example:
- A spa day with your girlfriends might have sounded great when you booked the date. At the time, you were in the follicular phase of your cycle (when you feel social), and had a light workload.
- But then the day comes and you’re premenstrual, with a project at work demanding more of your time than you’d expected. You have to be nice to your friends despite your irritability, and book in for a full-day treatment schedule despite your mental countdown to your work deadline.
- While there are benefits to social time and bodywork, you’re not able to feel rested because you’d rather be cocooned at home with your laptop. Instead of feeling calm, you leave feeling tense and socially depleted.
So how do we rest better?
Keys to foster rest
We can cultivate harmony between our feelings, motivations, and actions by embracing the following concepts.
Natural rhythms
Align with the natural rhythms of the day, month, and season. Take a rest as you transition from one task to another in the day, schedule events around your menstrual cycle, and honour how you feel in the winter versus the summer.
Letting go
You don’t have to do everything yourself. Trust and have confidence in others, allowing them to help you. Having faith in a higher power is also conducive to rest.
Safe relationships
Being accepted without judgment and not having to behave in a certain way is conducive to rest. Invest your time and effort into beneficial relationships, and walk away from toxic ones.
Calm and peace―now
If you’re noticing a sense of calm and peace in the moment and want to indulge in it, then do so! Be spontaneous and temporarily step away from your pressures and demands. Embrace being less productive, responsible, or helpful to others in this moment.
Pleasure and creativity
Appreciate the beauty in nature, music, and art. Take the time to not only take in and enjoy the beauty, but to also answer the call to create what you’re compelled to create.
Strategies for resting easy
- Seize the moment and rest when you feel a need.
- Set boundaries with work and family demands.
- Get an accountability partner for scheduled you-time.
- Be open to typically “nonrestful” activities for rest if they cultivate harmony between your feelings, motivations, and actions.
Feeling rested
Mental-emotional health
We feel mental fatigue after prolonged periods of cognitive activity. Mental fatigue is a psychobiological state involving cognitive decline, reduced accuracy, and slower reaction time. Symptoms may include temperamental depression, moodiness, and changeability, which may create relationship difficulties and challenges at work; it can sometimes lead to substance abuse.
Rest Rx: Research shows that listening to music and binaural beats helps ease mental fatigue. Having a regular meditation practice may also reduce the negative effects of mental fatigue.
Physical health
When we’re physically fatigued, we can experience symptoms ranging from insomnia, chronic pain, digestive issues, heart conditions, and gynecological problems. While there isn’t a biological explanation for every physical symptom of fatigue, researchers have developed an umbrella term for exhaustion-related symptoms, called persistent physical symptoms (PPS).
Rest Rx: Research shows that nonsleep deep rest (NSDR) improves physical readiness, exercise recovery, tension, emotional balance, negative affect, and overall stress. In this study, the NSDR was elicited by lying down on a mat in a dark, quiet room and doing 10 minutes of guided meditation exercises.
Spiritual health
Spiritual well-being involves maintaining healthy self-esteem and having a sense of meaning and purpose in life. If you’re feeling spiritually unwell, you may feel disconnected from yourself and others, and may question your role in life. Depleting one’s spiritual reserves can lead to compassion fatigue, which is common among caregivers.
Rest Rx: Research shows that prayer is associated with higher feelings of being loved, less anxiety, and fewer depressive symptoms. Loving-kindness meditation may contribute to enhanced self-esteem, while mindfulness exercises may assist compassion fatigue.
Quiz: What type of rest do you need?
Medical doctor and researcher Saundra Dalton-Smith, MD, proposes seven key types of rest:
Physical rest: Do you feel tightness, stiffness, or physical pain, even after a good night’s sleep?
Mental rest: Do you have trouble focusing on tasks or turning your brain off at the end of the day?
Spiritual rest: Do you feel like your work lacks purpose or that your life doesn’t make a meaningful impact?
Emotional rest: Do you often suppress your feelings or feel taken advantage of by others?
Social rest: Do your relationships drain your energy more than they restore it?
Sensory rest: Do you feel overwhelmed by noise, screens, or bright lights in your environment?
Creative rest: Do you feel uninspired or stuck in a rut, especially when problem-solving or brainstorming?
This article was originally published in the May 2025 issue of alive magazine.
Dr. Cassie Irwin, ND, works with soul-led women who are ready to expand their intuition and calibrate to their ultimate state of being.
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