Return. Rest. Repeat.

Responding to the invitation to find rest.

If you’re just joining us, welcome! You’re reading short letters written to my past self as I navigated darkness and difficulty. The letters can be read on their own, in no particular order. However, if you’d like to start at the beginning, you can find that here.

Eventually, you will learn rest. This will not come naturally to you, but with time, attention, and practice, you will come to trust its tug on your soul. Your body and nervous system have truly only known one way of being, which was less about being and more about doing. As you come to trust that you are safe, you will discover what it looks like to shift into a new gear, a way of allowing yourself to simply be a human being.

Photo by Author

You will wonder at the pull to rest. You will resist it, you will deny it, you will even try to silence it. The voice of fear says that you must keep going, working, and producing in order to be valuable. The inner voice of love speaks softly and gently in the moments of quiet, inviting you to pause, rest, and know God. As you learn to listen to the inner voice of love, you will learn to trust the narrow way.

Truly, rest requires trust. We must trust that our value is inherent and not earned by incessant activity and productivity. We must trust that our anxieties will not become realities the moment we pause our effort. We trust our bodies to help us notice when our weariness needs gentleness and compassion.

All of this is counterintuitive to the way you have learned to survive. You will worry that slowing down, practicing a Sabbath, and listening to your body’s cues will turn into laziness. You will wonder about losing your drive, your energy, your ability to get things done. Trust the inner voice of love that invites you to rest. Trust that you do not need to earn the pause. The pause is a gift of grace. There are many things that will wear you out and wear you down. The invitation to return to the inner voice of love, to the living waters that won’t run dry, and to the Spirit of God within you, is always there. No matter what you face, or where you go, the invitation follows. Rest, dear one. Remember that you are a beloved child of God. That is your inheritance, the gift of grace that cannot be earned.

Return. Rest. Repeat.

You will find that the practice of rest feels like a stretch in the beginning. Your body is doing something new and different that it doesn’t quite understand. After a while, it becomes a habit that you ease your way into over and over again. A time comes when you begin to see the freedom that is yours when you no longer resist. You slowly begin to return and respond almost unconsciously and without hesitation. There’s an inner yes that answers on your behalf. Remember these subtle glimpses when you inevitably find yourself filled again with judgment and doubt in the face of your need. Listen and trust the voice that whispers, “Come to me when you are weary and burdened and find rest.”

As always, take what you need and leave the rest.

Karissa

P.S. The inner voice of love is a phrase that comes from Henri Nouwen. I find it to be a lovely way to describe the voice of God/Spirit/Divine within all of us. You can find his book by that title linked here. I highly recommend it.