Making the topic of rest part of your work is a funny old thing. It can get very meta. Let me offer some examples. I’m a night owl and often find myself in the twilight hours perched on my sofa, wrapped in a soft, fluffy blanket with a hot cup of Horlicks in hand, ready to work. As I take my dive down a digital rabbit hole of research about the benefits of a good night’s sleep and the ubiquitous mod cons that may get in the way of achieving such a thing, I am rarely shocked to discover that it wasn’t a rabbit hole at all but a trapdoor and I walked right into it. On other occasions, just the mention of some restful activity inspires me to release any ounce of motivation I once felt towards that day’s workload in order to master this newly acquired practice. That could be considered research in its own right, I suppose.
These are just my personal examples and, to be completely transparent, they are made up. But they’re a long winded attempt at illustrating my point: when rest is what we’re working on, how we work, and whether it leaves room for rest, feels impossible to ignore.
If I may zoom out a little from my personal experience, I’d like to introduce you to Ben. Ben and I have been working together on this little rest project for a few months now, the full scope of which will be revealed to you, dear reader, in due course. Watch this space. But, for now, this is Ben:
Hi, Ben. Ben and I have worked together before and we do a pretty alright-okay-not-bad job of it, if I do say so myself. Ben works hard, thinks deeply, and creates beautiful, interesting, important things. Ben’s great. Ben needs some rest. Join the club, Ben.
Well, that’s the thing. Ben did join the club, this little rest project club and now, on top of all the other wonderful projects Ben works on, he also has this one to worry about. Great.
It seems that, in taking on this project, Ben and I are faced with a fundamental paradox: how to work restfully. Work, as defined in the world I grew up in, is the opposite of rest. Rest is what happens when you’re not working. So what are Ben and I to do? Inspired by Dr Nerina Ramlakhan, a sleep expert who encourages us to come to work and rest, we put our creative hats on and came up with some ideas for intertwining these supposed conceptual foes in our own professional context:
What do I need? Simple yet essential. Awareness of our individual needs and a receptive space in which to voice them helps us keep our personal wellbeing on track. This is at the top of any agenda and could reveal all sorts of novel working practices, e.g.: “ I need to stretch before we start”, “I need to move: I’m going to take this call walking”, “I need you to laugh. Know any good jokes?”
Accepting the pace. Expectations of unrealistic timelines are a fast-track to nothing but stressful overtime. I mean that on both ends of the spectrum. Timeline too tight and there is no space for anything remotely restful. However, for an overly keen bean like myself, a slow-moving project can also be far from restful. I just want it to happen right NOW!!! So I wear myself out feeling restless.
Breathe. It keeps you alive. And when done mindfully, it can feel like a welcome micro-rest.
Fair compensation. Ben and I spoke about this early on at the inception of this project. When we get something going that inspires financial flow back in our direction, we want it to feel like we are paid enough not just to live but to rest, and rest well.
This is an experiment and we often fail. We forget to ask ourselves what we need, we try to meet someone else’s pace, we go days without acknowledging our breath. And, very often, the things listed above feel out of our control. So we’re still asking questions and we are very much still learning. We are confronting the absurdity of restful work as we work on rest, and we’ll continue to share with you how it goes.
Any tips for restful working? Let us know! We will compile useful resources to share with all you lovely readers in a future post. Email us at hello@therestpod.com.