What kind of tired are you?

I'm probably all of them

Our time is hungry for spirit.

When we devote no time to the inner life, we lose the habit of soul. We become accustomed to keeping things at surface level. The deeper questions about who we are and what we are here for visit us less and less.

If we allow time for soul, we will come to sense its dark and luminous depth.

If we fail to acquaint ourselves with soul, we will remain strangers in our own lives.

— John O’Donohue

I am tired.

I have been moving house.

Keeping up my strength training in the mornings.

And going on dates that end late in the night.

I try to soothe my tiredness, however sleep is only one type of rest.

This realisation began my obsession with resting three years ago when I wrote Cosmic Rest And The Seven Types of Rest You Need.

Yes, I bang on about rest a lot. Because it works.

The right type of rest can bring you back to life.

I want to become Irish moss.

Until then, I need to skill up.

A gal had a moss dream and that MOSS DREAM CAME TRUE on Achill Island, Ireland.

I now ask myself ‘What kind of rest do I need?’ daily and this question has changed my life.

There must be more to life than being tired all the time.

And there is!

But you have to be well-rested first.

David Whyte’s words in Sweet Darkness whirl around in my head, reminding me that: “When your eyes are tired, the world is tired also.”

Another way of looking at it is:

What kind of tired are you?

What type of rest are you missing out on?

If you have no clue, this is for you.

Saundra Dalton-Smith¹ first wrote about the seven types of rest and I added one that was missing. I echo her: ‘Rest requires submission of the soul, and the soul wants what the soul wants’.

The Eight Types of Rest and How to Actually Get Them

1. Physical Rest — not just sleep

Allow your body to recuperate in restorative ways:

• Go to bed earlier than normal (and before 10 pm)

• Sleep in with no alarm clock

• Take breaks to stretch and move — like right now

• Nap without guilt

• Leave intentional space between two appointments

• Lay on grass for 10 minutes

• Soak in a warm bath

• Get a massage

• A sauna with a friend

• Yin class or yoga nidra for effortless relaxation
  

Sleep is the symbol of re-birth. In creation myths, souls go to sleep while a transformation of some duration takes place, for in sleep, we are re-created, renewed. In sleep we are once again brought back to a state of sweetness. In sleep we are remade.

— Clarissa Pinkola Estés

2. Mental Rest — switch off all devices and inputs

Take a break from processing information and constant stimulation:

• Silence in the car

• Phone on airplane mode when you sleep

• Meditate using a mantra, an app or focus on breathing

• Do one thing mindfully — like just reading this article

• Remove all sounds, alerts and notifications on your phone

• Make your home screen boring²

• Inhale fresh air

• Sit by a fire
  

What are we doing? Just sitting. Who is just sitting? No one. Where are we going? Nowhere. When will we arrive? Now. Where will we return? Here. What is our purpose? Nothing.

— Mutribo

3. Emotional Rest — rebuild your emotional scaffolding

Digest emotional overload and give yourself some calm:

• Nature soaking

• Herbalism support like a tincture or plant medicine

• Funny lighthearted movie or series

• Comedy show

• Hug a cat or a dog or tree

• Journal to process something alone

• Talk things out with a good friend
  

Sometimes someone isn’t ready to see the bright side. Sometimes they need to sit with the shadow first. So be a friend and sit with them. Make the darkness beautiful.

— Victoria Erickson

4. Social Rest — alone or in comforting company

Quality, not quantity, of socialising and solitude:

• Say no to people who deplete you

• Say yes to people who give you energy / nurture you

• Go home when you’re tired

• Text back “I’d like to see how I feel on the day”

• If you have an empty social battery, know your limits

• Walk with a loved one / a loved podcast

• Find solace with another or your solitude
  

You must develop a relationship with your aloneness that is as profound and sacred as any other relationship in your life. You will come to belong to your aloneness as much as to any place, job, or community. Solitudo is Latin for nature. In true solitude, you remember yourself as a part of everything, a part of nature. You rediscover ease, inspiration, belonging, and wisdom in your own company.

— Bill Plotkin

5. Sensory Rest — pause overloading your senses

Reprieve from constant input and unjack your nervous system:

• No music or any sound in the car

• Turn off the TV and close your laptop

• Reduce overhead lights at night — use candles and salt lamps

• Light a stick of incense

• Eat a simple meal to give your digestion a break

• Cut off itchy tags and ditch uncomfortable fabrics

• Use a beanie on a plane to pull down over your eyes

• Wear blue-light blocking glasses to ease digital eye strain
  

When an animal living in the forest is injured, she knows what to do. She stops searching for something to eat or looking for a mate. She knows, through generations of ancestral knowledge, that it’s not good for her to do so. She finds a quiet place and just lies down, doing nothing. Animals instinctively know that stopping is the best way to get healed. They don’t need a doctor, a drug store, or a pharmacist.

We human beings used to have this kind of wisdom. But we have lost touch with it. We don’t know how to rest anymore. We don’t allow the body to rest, to release the tension, and heal.

— Thich Nhat Hanh

6. Creative Rest — you don’t always have to be “on”

Let go of the pressure to produce and create:

• Listen to your favourite sweet spot music — Cozy Longing for me

• Read good writing to inspire your own (This short story gave me life from the opening line to the power-punch crescendo: “One night, not so very long ago, I walked into a bar and found, as if he had been placed there just for me, the most handsome man in the world.”)

• Write out poetry and quotes with a big mug of chai

• Unstructured time with yourself / hanging out with no purpose

• Leave one day free of plans — call it your “Sacred Sunday'“

• Soak in natural beauty

• Linger over a great meal

Inspiration is disturbing. She does not believe in guarantees or insurance or strict schedules. She is not interested in how well you write your grant proposal or what you do for a living or why you are too busy to see her. She will be there when you need her but you have to take it on trust. Surrender. She knows when you need her better than you do.

— J. Ruth Gendler

7. Spiritual Rest — switch from doing to being

Recharge your spirit to awaken wonder and awe:

• Savour your favourite cup of tea or coffee in the morning

• Do a simple ritual or ceremony

• Immerse in nature and therapeutic silence

• Volunteer at a community garden, animal shelter or elderly home

• Garden, sing, chant, play an instrument, or try a new type of dance

• Dip in the ocean / river / lake

• Step outside to gaze at the stars
  

As you allow stillness to permeate your life, you more and more recognize the movement towards softness, and you grow more and more sensitive. The breath naturally becomes softer and softer as the mind quietens – it does this, not you. It is a natural movement of Nature, requiring no human intervention. There is nothing to do… just be and let whatever happens occur on its own accord.

— Wu De

8. Cosmic Rest — give yourself exactly what you need

Whatever revives your soul and brings you alive:

This one came to me, so I will give you some prompts. This is your full permission slip to do anything you want. I mean it.

• What would make you giddy, buzzing, elated with excitement to do and tell no one about?

• What would you do if you were not obligated to make anyone happy but yourself?

• When was the last time you experienced a transcendent moment of peace and overwhelming joy?

• Take a day off and keep it to yourself.

• This is how I experience cosmic rest³: A 2-hour massage. Bowl of fries. Listening to Bon Iver lying on the floor. Tea ceremony in nature. An afternoon cinema screening. Self-pleasure. Fits of laughter with a friend.

Whatever brings you back to life, do that.

The magic of what happens is the last time I had a cosmic rest day, I got a book idea. Clarity comes. And so does relief and soul restoration.

I waited so long for love
and suddenly, here it is
standing in the garden, hands full
of heirlooms hot from the sun.

Soon we’ll make a supper of them.
Salted slabs between slices of bread.
Your beard silvers. My hips ripen.
The mail piles up.

Phone calls go unanswered. Forgive us.
Our mouths are full of tomatoes.
We are so busy
being small and hungry and alive.

— Joy Sullivan

I am here to be fully live.

And I am hoping you are too.

To feel our aliveness, we need to be fully available to life.

I am very unavailable when my soul is tired.

As the philosopher Seneca so aptly nailed two thousand years ago, “We shall always long for leisure, but never enjoy it.”

Enjoy intentional resting.

Enjoy feeling full on your own.

Enjoy how your rest ripples out to others that you love and care for.

Nothing changes until you do.

You have to decide to make rest a priority or even a possibility.

A gentle reminder that resting is not the same as numbing out.

What’s the difference?

• Active rest looks like: Things that fill you up, release tension and replenish you that are restful i.e. cooking mindfully, reading, playing with children or animals, gardening, films, crafting, napping, skipping the gym to swim in the ocean.

• Numbing out looks like: Things that drain you, are aimless distractions, shutting you off to avoid feeling, and ultimately depleting you i.e. binge watching, excessive shopping, eating, drinking, compulsive scrolling.
  

You’re probably too busy to rest. You’re also too busy to be unwell.

We often overshoot the mark with how much we can actually “do”.

Rest is about making well-being a top priority, despite how it messes with your plans. When we rest, we receive. I've not looked back.

Your soul hungers for rest.

Life is sublime.

May you allow time for your soul.

Burnout comes when you spend too long ignoring your own needs.

It is an incremental sickening that builds from exhaustion upon exhaustion, overwhelm upon overwhelm.

— Katherine May

So ask yourself —

What kind of tired am I?

What type of rest do I need?

I am genuinely excited to know yours and pass on this valuable life tool!

What kind of rest resonates with you the most right now?

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Monthly and annual subscribers are energetically supporting the current process of writing my first book (see: stack of second draft notes) — I keep access to my pieces free and upgrading means a lot, or you can shout me a one-off chai with honey which also fuels the soul.

I’m co-hosting a Late Summer Deep Rest, Reading and Ritual Retreat at the end of March 2025 where you will experience AND embody all eight types of rest — we have a Rest Menu, tea ceremonies, nature immersion, and fully-body nourishment in a forest by the sea in Wooditjup / Margaret River. Two spots remain! All retreat details here.

1. Sacred Rest - I read her book so you don’t have to. There are lots of Bible verses that I am not averse to (Jesus was a revolutionary) but it did bog the flow. A zinger line: “The most stressed-out people are those most responsive to their technology.”

2. How to make your phone boring - Remove notifications (goodbye red bubble), silence all sounds, use airplane mode when you need headspace, delete all apps that you don’t use, unsubscribe from email lists, and my favourite – make your home screen just a photo! Do this by moving all apps to folders so you have to swipe to access them on the next screen. When I open my phone, I only see my cat CousCous sitting for a tea ceremony.

3. 21 nourishing ways to spend time alone — I wrote about how solitude is one of my food groups with lots of ideas for you. While rest can take place in the comforting company of someone else, my soul time is often solo. I am a Projector.