I’m tired of multi-tasking. I’m tired of productivity. I’m tired of the blurred lines between work and home. I’m tired of scrolling Instagram while watching a football game, talking on the phone while searching online for a recipe, and people texting everywhere — including behind the wheel of a car. If we are in the present moment, it’s a moment splintered into a dozen pieces. We rarely do one thing at a time, and if we do happen to do one thing, the one thing is rarely rest.
Yet, we are designed to require rest in order to function well. Sleep is not a weakness; it’s a building strategy. To rest is not to take your foot off the gas. To rest is to stop for fuel. But I bet that when you actually stop for fuel you scroll your phone, check your messages, maybe even send off a quick email.
We demand a strong work ethic from ourselves, and we teach a strong work ethic to our children. That’s not a bad thing.
St. Josemaría Escrivá wrote, “It is no good offering to God something that is less perfect than our poor human limitations permit. The work that we offer must be without blemish and it must be done as carefully as possible, even in its smallest details, for God will not accept shoddy workmanship. ‘Thou shalt not offer anything that is faulty,’ Holy Scripture admonishes us (Lev 22:20), ‘because it would not be worthy of him.’ For that reason, the work of each one of us, the activities that take up our time and energy, must be an offering worthy of our Creator. It must be operatio Dei, a work of God that is done for God: in short, a task that is complete and faultless.”
What the saint describes is holy work. It is work done for the glory of God. What so many of us pursue in the name of productivity is fear-driven, pedal-to-the-metal careening in a getaway car. Jokingly, we talk about FOMO — fear of missing out. Perhaps that’s your fear, that you will exclude yourself from something you wish you’d experienced. Or perhaps it’s fear of something else?
What fear drives you to always be engaged, to refuse to be in silence, to run from genuine rest? Is it scarcity? Are you worried there won’t be enough of (fill in the blank with your own want or need here)? What are you afraid will catch up with you if you aren’t in perpetual motion? Are you running from a long-held threat to your sense of safety and wellbeing? You don’t want to confront the threat and do the work necessary to vanquish the threat, so you live in a state of constant mental activity. You are afraid that if you aren’t vigilantly scanning the horizon, clicking on this, and taking that call, whatever demon is pursuing you will catch you at last.
St. Josemaría Escrivá describes a kind of work that is done with a purpose and a focus. It’s not distracted work. And when the work is done, there is time for rest. You know that your work is for the glory of God when you are unafraid to rest in his protection and provision. You can put the work aside and look up with clear eyes and notice the goodness he has made tangible and touchable for you, uniquely and distinctly.
The reality is that there is no sustainable, long-term progress or productivity without genuine rest. We were created to rest. Rest isn’t a reward we earn by pushing so hard for so long that we crash and burn. Our bodies are wired to need the replenishment that comes with rest. Our brains need to pause in order to receive. And our souls crave silence for contemplative reflection. Rest is a steady, consistent requirement for growth, and goodness, and glory.
If you consistently refuse to rest, it’s time to ask yourself what fear compels you to run so hard.
Foss, whose website is takeupandread.org, writes from Connecticut.
