How To Rest Without Feeling Guilty
Apr 26, 2022
Society glorifies nonstop hustle so much that having a guilt-free rest is almost impossible. Using your vacation days to work instead of taking a break has been normalized as a characteristic of a hardworking employee. This should not be the case. Yanet Borrego is here to discuss how to rest without feeling guilty and perform at your best after getting a breath of fresh air. She also shares four basic steps to do this, making the process even more fulfilling.
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How To Rest Without Feeling Guilty
Welcome to episode number 31. I cannot believe that it has been more than six months since I started this journey of podcasting and I'm loving it. The part that I love the most is sharing all these stories and topics with all of you, so we can learn from each other and benefit from things that we're all working on. Our topic makes me passionate because we all struggle with this. The more we talk about it, the more we get to grow in this area.
Our topic is about how to rest without feeling guilty. Have you ever been in the space of wanting to rest than actually doing it? You get on a sofa or maybe your bed and you start scrolling through social media. You start boycotting yourself and saying, “What am I doing? I have things to do. I have to clean the house. I have to do these podcasts. I have to do this business thing.” It's crazy how much of our time we spend thinking about things we're not doing at the moment. If you're resting, just rest. We feel so much guilt while doing that.
Society programs us to feel guilty and be in production mode all the time, which is not sustainable at all. A big part of this is social media. When you scroll through social media, what do you see? We all go to social media to post our highlights, achievements and most productive days. No one is talking about being lazy or unmotivated because we want social media to be a highlight of our life.
If you are feeling that you need that rest and you need to recover and detox, why do we go to social media when we know we are going to start comparing ourselves and feel bad because we are not doing something else? Part of this is that we don't allow ourselves that time to be in the present moment. We don't allow ourselves to be. There is this addiction to doing. I'm guilty of this as all of us are.
I love one of my teachers. He said, “We are not human doings. We are human beings.” Why not allow that space to be there with you with the most important person in your world, yourself? You're the foundation for everything else in this life, for your family, business, physical health, nutrition and everything. You deserve to get there to a sofa, bed or wherever you rest, even if it's a floor in a yoga mat.
Get wherever you want to go and stay there in silence. Tune out any external inputs and tune into only important matters or your input. It's interesting that we behave like this towards ourselves because not even machines do that. I remember being a process engineer at the beginning of my corporate career. I’m working in a refinery. We would shut down the unit that I was working on every 2 to 4 years to make maintenance on the equipment.
Not even that equipment operates nonstop. Everything needs maintenance including your car, iPhone, cell phone, computer, whatever operating system you have. We all need to maintain and update ourselves. Why do we behave like machines? Even machines need that maintenance. Why do we have unrealistic expectations of producing and delivering all the time without allowing that space to rest and tune in to our own input and just be?
One of the biggest challenges here is social media because everyone is producing all the time. Everyone is productive. Everyone has brand deals and all of these things that we want. I post all my speaking engagements and coaching calls. Sometimes I'm trying to do more of these. Sometimes I need to rest, decompress and have a digital detox from social media. I try to post consistently at the same time. Sometimes, I go MIA for a little bit because I need to recharge my batteries. Everything else in this life and even nature has different seasons. That's important for you to understand because you deserve to get that rest.
I wanted to share with you this story. I remember the first year of my corporate job. In this company that I was working for, they would send emails whenever someone was retiring or if a new hire came in. I remember joining that first year as a full-time employee. Those were my engineering years. I remember getting this email about this guy that was retiring.
In this retirement email, they would talk about the guy's contributions, highlights, and the many things he did. One of the highlights is, “This person never took a sick day in his twenty-plus years of career,” or probably more. I was like, “Why is that a highlight? Why is someone proud of it? Why is a company saying that that's something that they are proud of? This guy had to be sick within those twenty years. He probably came sick at work.”
It's this promotion of not resting and producing all the time, 24/7, when that's not realistic in the first place. That's not sustainable at all for anyone, any human being, any machine or computer. Why do we have to expect ourselves to do something totally unrealistic? I want you to think of that because that guilt is driven by comparison and by seeing what everyone else is doing. People don't promote that they're resting. The whole promotion is about doing and achieving.
At least from my perspective, I do have days that I rest. Honestly, it was a forced rest because my body was telling me, “You need to rest.” I kept pushing until I got to a point physically and mentally where I couldn't deliver anymore. I forced myself to rest at that point. We don't want to get to that point. That's not healthy at all. What's important is to allow yourself and acknowledge that you got to recover and recharge in order to produce more, be more productive, be more creative, and show up as your best self.
Everyone has to maintain and update themselves.
Have you ever had a day where maybe you didn't sleep as much and you felt awful, compared to a day where you got fully recharged and you were feeling great physically, mentally, and you showed up as your best self? There is a difference there. Often we act like there is none. The other part is that this is a decision that you got to make for yourself.
The people that you're working with are not going to be like, “You need a day of rest. You should do it.” You got to do it for yourself. You got to show off and put those boundaries for yourself because no one else will do it for you. Maybe you have a best friend that will bring it up or something, but you got to take that responsibility for yourself and show off as your refreshed self. Not only that but also give an example to everyone else around you that they truly deserve that rest.
When I was working in corporate, the previous company that I was with did a great job encouraging people to take a vacation. They are letting them know, “You need that vacation.” Leadership is showing off and stepping up to show the way. In the past, in our society, we still battle with that. We recognize that when we don't take time for ourselves, it is this hostile mentality. I saw it a lot in my corporate years.
People are saying, “Last year, I just took half of my vacation,” like it’s something to be proud of, which makes no sense. They would wear it as a badge of honor, “I don't take all my vacation days. I have 82% of my vacation unused.” If you're one of these, I'm not criticizing you. I'm encouraging you to not do that because you're not giving an example to everyone else around you. You also need that rest for yourself to strengthen that foundation and show off as your best self. That is why it's important to rest.
I have a couple of tips that will allow you to rest without feeling guilty. I hope you're ready at this point. There are four steps to this. This is an acronym that I created, ISBE. “Is” is a conjugation of the verb “be.” Why? Because resting is a lot about being. Why not? Everything has to be around being. The I or the first letter of the acronym is whenever you recognize that you need this rest, and even before that, you got to be proactive, is to set an intention of what resting means to you and also visualize it. When you are all rested, recovered and refreshed, what are the benefits that you're going to encounter in your journey? How will you be able to show off with yourself and other people around you? I is for Intention.
The S is for Schedule it. If it's not on the calendar, it is not going to happen. Schedule your vacation days and be intentional. Put it in the calendar. If it's not on the calendar, it is out of sight. Out of sight means out of mind. B is all about Being, allowing yourself to relax, let go, surrender and be. Ideally, for most of the resting time, we'll exclude doing.
Ideally, whenever you're resting, you're just being there with yourself in silence, tuning into your own input or whatever that is for you. If you're on vacation, that may be sitting in front of the beach and just listening to the waves and being there. We are human beings, but we are so out of tune with these being energy. We are so addicted to doing. Sometimes you got to sit in silence and listen to nature or do something that makes you feel completely relaxed.
The last one is for E, Erase all the social media during this time. Do some digital detox. That is important. Nowadays, it's a must to maintain our mental health and wellness. The acronym is ISBE. The I is for Intention. It's being intentional with your rest and also setting your intention. After you feel rested and refreshed, what is that going to look like? Visualize the benefits of you getting there. The S is for Scheduling, put it in the calendar because if it's not there, it's not going to happen.
The B is for Being or tuning into being energy that we are so uncomfortable with sometimes. You can be mindful and meditate. Being is all about being in the present moment. It's about being here and allowing yourself to not worry, not think of your to-do list. The E is for Erase all that social media. It’s not in a literal sense, but it's having a digital detox because you deserve it.
I hope this episode helped, motivated and inspired you to take some time to rest and recover without feeling guilty. Shut off the social media because I truly feel that’s the biggest contributor for us to feel that guilt. We see everyone posting, doing and celebrating magnificent things. You are not in that state of mind. You're in the state of mind of being. Connect with that energy whenever you are resting. I hope you enjoyed that episode. As always, if you found this helpful and you know someone that needs to hear this message, please share the episode. I appreciate all of you. This show wouldn't exist without you all. I hope you have a wonderful resting time.
Important Links
- https://www.YBCoaching.com/purpose
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