Note: As I shared on social media this week, cognitive dissonance and grasping onto normalcy is where I’m at this week. I’m processing and grieving for humanity in my own way. Words feel wholly inadequate to capture the incalculable grief, outrage, fear, and inhumanity ignited in this word. So, I won’t attempt at platitudes. If these lighter topics I’m sharing today aren’t sitting well, please skip and take care of yourself first. Sending love to you all.
Rest.
It’s a topic that crosses your mind a lot when you decide to take a year long sabbatical. As I’ve been unpacking my internalized thoughts on rest, I’ve realized , it’s always been a means to an end. A stepping stone or something else or something I have to earn. It’s almost physically impossible for me to rest merely for rest’s sake.
For most of my life rest had to be earned. I had to work myself into the ground to “deserve” a moment of relaxation. As if I’m only worthy of a break once I’ve put enough sweat equity to get my weekly allocation of recuperation. For me that often looked like sprinting so fast and hard in my life that I literally had no other choice but to collapse on the couch at the end of the week, hoping my toddler doesn’t find me. More on that not so fun lifelong cycle in my burnout post.
Rest’s other purpose in my life? A productivity hack. If only I rest, then I can tackle my infinite to do list or release pent up creativity in my brain to launch the next project at work. Silence, sleep, meditation, or any variation of rest became a means to an end, a way to uplevel my status in grind culture. Trust me, I excelled at earning those grind culture gold stars.
One of my goals on this year-long sabbatical was to rewire my brain around rest. To actually take time to embody it, to realize as I human being, I deserve rest regardless of the productivity. Candidly, I’m not doing great with this radical idea that rest does not have to be earned, but I’m working on it.
If you were to do one thing for rest this weekend for no other purpose than to rest, what you do? A thirty-minute cat nap on the couch? Turning off social media or the news? Reading a book just for pleasure? Share in the comments!
Blog Posts You Might Have Missed…
Making Friends as an Adult: moving to a new place means rebuilding your community. It feels it’s so much harder as an adult, so I put together a few of my favorite tips.
Desire Pulling & the Day I Decided to Move to Portugal (on LinkedIn): even my closest friends likely haven’t heard the full story about how the decision to move to Europe came about. Lucky for you I finally got around to writing it. It involves almost burning down our kitchen and desire pulling! Plus, I give you three super simple tips to try out desire pulling on your own.
New Project!
I’ve started writing over on LinkedIn with my mentor Laura Close and her executive coaching firm Close Cohen Career Consulting. I’ll be sharing thoughts and tips on all things job search, pay negotiation, executive leadership, and building your career, but also parts of my burnout story. If you’re on LinkedIn and want to read a different perspective from me, please follow along!
What I’m Loving…
Podcast I’m loving: No More Grind: How to Finally Rest with Tricia Hersey on We Can Do Hard Things I actually relistened to this podcast. If you want some thought provoking philosophy changes, start here! Listen and then message me your thoughts, I’d love to chat about this one.
Recipe I’m loving: Nutella banana nut bread in
’s cookbook Zoë Bakes Cakes.Substack article I’m loving:
“are you there, god? it’s me, erin” on daycare closures, building sales, AI, and life in a constant state of precarity.Term I’m loving: snail girl era as the antithesis to boss girl era. Now, that’s some energy I can get behind. Intrigued? Read more by Sienna Ludbey.
Cocktail I’m loving: a sbagliato - it still feels a bit like summer in Porto, so I’m hanging on as long as I can. Sbagliato recipe: 1 oz. sweet vermouth, 1 oz. campari, 1 oz. prosecco and garnish with an orange or lemon peel.
Sending much love into this heavy world,
Cheyanne