Even though our bodies and minds are begging for a break, modern culture has turned rest into a sin. So how can we catch a breath?
I’ll start by telling my own story. It will serve as proof that I represent one of the most severe deficits of contemporary society: I don’t know how to rest. However, it also shows that each of us is the best healer of our own exhaustion and can find a way to deep rest. The path is simple to walk, but hard to enter. Especially now, when an urbanized civilization forces its amped-up pace of existence upon us, along with inflated activity norms. But first, we need to escape the rocket in which we are hurling through life.
The purpose
“When was the last time you went for a holiday?”
This question took me by surprise. It was a beautiful summer afternoon, golden sunshine and light wind seeped into the room. For a long time, I watched the waving lace curtain. I counted, carefully backtracking my memories. The psychiatrist waited, watching me kindly.
“Eight years ago,” I said slowly, hardly believing those words. I hadn’t taken any breaks between the 29th and 37th years of my life.
“Well, perhaps it’s high time for some rest, then?” he said, the question floating gently in the air, light and delicate. “The more work there is in your life, the more time you should make for rest. It may sound like a paradox, but you need to maintain the balance between those two elements.”
Of course, I travelled plenty over the course of those eight years; I have been to many sunny places, usually associated with kicking back and relaxing. But every one of those trips had its purpose; I went there to see something, visit someone, write about it. And since my work is also my passion and lifestyle choice, it was easy to let the lines blur. For eight years, I failed to notice that I am never resting. The doctor did, though, and very mildly, he uttered the word burnout.
No purpose?
I had no idea what to do with myself. How do I go somewhere for no reason? Or maybe rather: to find peace, quiet, calm waters. And where? Where could I possibly go and have nothing to do, nothing to observe, nothing to describe?
“Go to Cornwall, it’s so beautiful over there!” suggested my sister.
“How do you know, have you been there?”
“No, but I’ve heard.”
Fair enough, Cornwall it is. The first leg of the trip was easy – I took a flight to London and spent a few fun August days in a vibrant city. I visited a bunch of galleries, bookshops, parks, went to two plays and three concerts. Then I bought a ticket to Penzance and got on a train in Paddington, feeling like a lost teddy bear riding to the most faraway place where no-one was waiting. The only point of reference I had in my head was Land’s End, a literal end of the world – the southernmost strip of British soil.
After years of hyperactivity, I plunged into
