The intervention of rest
“COME TO ME, ALL YOU THAT ARE WEARY AND ARE CARRYING HEAVY BURDENS, AND I WILL GIVE YOU REST. TAKE MY YOKE UPON YOU, AND LEARN FROM ME; FOR I AM GENTLE AND HUMBLE IN HEART, AND YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. FOR MY YOKE IS EASY, AND MY BURDEN IS LIGHT.”
Sometimes life comes at you so fast that you don’t realize how much you’ve been spinning until to you come to a screeching halt. This abrupt stop can present itself in numerous ways, but once it intervenes you find yourself bound to the stillness.
This last month has been one full of roller coasters for me. One minute I’m up and happy, and energized, ready to do more. Yet the next moment I find myself plummeting, screaming into a void, and confused about what I am experiencing and what I need to experience.
The movement of my world has been spinning so fast that I have not sought the time to pause, to rest. Instead I’ve pushed through and along this crazy path, suppressing my need to cry, ignoring my body’s pleas for rest, and numbing the chaos in my mind with the hope that it was all just a moment of over stimulation.
I have mastered the art of hiding this inner turmoil, that is until my being can no longer fake the funk. And it’s at that moment that I find myself walking into the intervention of rest.
As much as I understand the divinity of rest, I neglect to allow myself experience its love. I am quite sure that rest is a gift of love from the divine, because many times it has been my saving refuge when the world nor myself could provide the saving grace I so desperately needed.
And so this last month been a time of chaos, suppression, grief, illness, trauma, and frustration, and yet I still believed that I could continue on in my journey without surrendering to the divine intervention of rest.
IN ANY MOMENT I CAN SURRENDER TO THE POWERFUL PRESENCE OF LOVE THROUGH PRAYER, CONTEMPLATION, AND STILLNESS.
- GABRIELLE BERNSTEIN
Last Sunday during our healing circle, we discussed the difficulties of surrender and why it is so necessary to grant ourselves permission to radically provide and/or receive care for ourselves. We all challenged ourselves to grant ourselves permission to do one thing, that we have been neglecting for ourselves.
So here I am. Halted in time, paused in this moment. Surrendering to my need of divine love and rest from the business of my life. I have come to a place where I am not making the progress in my daily being because I am shaken up. I am not grounded, my foundation feels like it is shaking making it a struggle for me to actually identify the road I am supposed to be traveling.
An intervention of rest is well past due for me, as I need to take the time to re-calibrate away from it all, so that I might return more deeply connected than I left.
With the support of my spiritual coach, close friends, and my own healing circles, I have made the decision to take a brief sabbatical for the month of August. One where I will disconnect from all social media, and pause the healing circles, so that I can surrender to the intervention of rest in my life right now.
I will be stepping back from as much as possible, so that I can devote to myself the time and space that I need to heal, restore, and refocus.
Rest is a divine act and state of being. To be in constant movement doesn’t create productivity. It does not guarantee alignment or the best outcome. It only guarantees motion. Motion is not bad, but sometimes stillness is necessary to be the catalyst for movement.
I am grateful for your love and support, and asking for your continued prayers and support as I give myself permission to surrender to this radical act of care in this moment. It is my hope that through this intervention of rest, I will gain the clarity, love, and resources necessary to ensure my movement is intentional and not scattered.
I encourage you to find a way to grant permission to yourself to find rest and rejuvenation.
Love,
Ashley
