The Magic of Rest
Many of us are tired. Emotionally and physically drained. And with the pressure of societal expectations and generational trauma, we learn to be hard on ourselves, which exacerbates our situation, and then hard on our young people who are also tired, or who don’t see why we must to push through our tiredness. Unrelenting stress on our nervous system may lead to depression, triggers migraines and other autoimmune symptoms, weakens our digestive system, lowers our immune system, and wreaks havoc on our hormone health. For many, we do not rest until serious symptoms force us to rest, giving us a socially acceptable “out.”
These dark moments call us to rediscover life-giving spiritual reflection practices of gratitude for even the smallest of things, self-compassion and forgiveness. To survive these uncertain times, we’re being asked to create wells of inner strength and spiritual fortitude individually and collectively. We are being called to stop and feel, and we find ourselves gravitating to emotional somatic healing practices that help us to process our experiences and integrate the learnings. The movement of those accessing therapy, seeking mind-body-spirit practices, and rediscovering ancestral healing practices is building. And intentional rest, rest that is restorative, integrating, and rejuvenating has become an essential practice to turn our lives around. As we create and reclaim sustainable life-giving practices on a day to day level, our hope is that building our awareness and these skills in our families and communities will change our culture for future generations.
Here are a few tips to maximize the self-healing power of our bodies during our break times, our sleep times, our quiet times:
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Prop your legs up - while lying down bring your legs up until your knees are at a 90 degree angle to the floor and your legs feel supported (prop with pillows or lie in front of a sofa or bed). This position allows the psoas muscle to release, relieving tension in the low back, hips, neck and shoulders. It also helps your nervous system move from a sympathetic to a parasympathetic (rest and digest) state and improves blood and lymph circulation. You can also do a yoga posture called viparita karani (Sanskrit for ‘inverted action’), aka legs-up-the-wall pose with similar effects. 10 to 20 minutes with your legs propped up in this way can help to relieve stress and calm the mind. This would be a good time to tune into emotions and tensions in the body which you can release in organic ways such as through conscious breathwork, sighing, stretching, humming, Tapping or listening to guided meditations or healing frequency music. Note contraindications here.
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Place your hands for a few minutes each on your crown, over your eyes, your ears, your upper chest/thymus and call healing energy to these areas, especially if you have been attuned to Reiki or other spiritual energy practices. Or you can massage the yin tang acupressure point in between your eyebrows in a gentle circular motion for a few minutes to ease restlessness, irritability, insomnia. Other helpful points are the taiyang point at the temples (the depression on the outer side of the eyebrows) to clear and calm the mind and alleviate headaches, vision fatigue and the governing vessel point at the crown of your head (place finger at the top of each ear and follow up to the top of the head and press the area where your two fingers meet) to release jaw tension, ease dizziness, and relieve overthinking.
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Sleep between 8:30pm and before 10pm to maximize your body’s repair and regenerative functions. In Chinese medicine, the 9-11pm time in the organ meridian clock is when the endocrine and metabolic systems, especially the thyroid and adrenals, recuperate and replenish. The medicine of early sleep is irreplaceable! If you are having a hard time sleeping early, are you having too much caffeine too late in the day? Are you getting enough exercise? Are you setting healthy boundaries around your schedule? If you wake during the night at a consistent time, view the Chinese organ meridian clock to get clues as to what emotions you may be processing or what lifestyle habits may need changing.
Besides prioritizing rest and checking in with your doctor to address any underlying conditions, creating a self-care regimen that nourishes your spirit, aligns and strengthens your body, and balances chakras/meridians on an ongoing basis will help you release stress and integrate learnings, so that you can bring your highest self to every situation!