In the rush of modern life, stillness evades us. To slow down is to find refuge and regeneration. 

From the heights of the Valbonë–Theth viewpoint, a deep green valley unfurls towards the horizon. The mountain pass, buffered by the jagged, snow-capped peaks of Albania’s Accursed Mountains, marks the midway point between two villages. In summer, the alpine air is cool and crisp; the cerulean streams still icy.

Hiking the hours-long trail requires frequent stops. From Theth, the path transforms from gentle slope to near-vertical ascent, snaking through dense pine forests and spilling into grassy fields. An intimidating walk tracing a cliff’s edge is the final crescendo; the top of the mountain ridge awaiting just beyond.

At times, the mountain’s brutal steepness demands hikers halt mid-track. Some lean against the pines, sipping water and wiping sweat from their foreheads. Others find a spot to sit for a while before they gather their strength and continue onwards.

To anyone on a strenuous hike, periodic rest is natural, an intuitive part of the process. Up there, we don’t think twice about stopping to catch our breath. We allow ourselves to linger, too — to watch the sun set, to dip our feet in the water — before we meander back down the mountain. Yet our modern lives, once our feet are back on terra firma, are often bereft of rest. Ironically, in chasing our ‘big break’, we consistently override our bodies’ demands to just chill — until the great flames of burnout finally engulf us. So why do we diminish its value? And how do we claw it back from the systems around us?

To rest is to attend to our disparate energies, to replenish our mental, emotional and creative reserves, and not only to lie wearily on the couch as we regain our physical strength. The kind of daily rest that feels most rejuvenating can look different for everyone. (If the experts agree on one thing, though, it’s that watching TV or scrolling social media feel relaxing, but are too stimulating for our brains to be revitalising.) 

“I’ve learned that rest comes in many forms,” says Roj Amedi, a campaigner and organiser. “It’s just as much about finding your flow state, sense of agency, building nourishing relationships and feeling empowered as it is about sleeping, eating and making time to do nothing.”

When we are not well-rested, we can feel a mix of emotions: tired, angry, depleted, directionless and uninspired. Yet many of us struggle to rest without feeling guilty. Perhaps it’s because we view rest as synonymous with ‘idleness’, ‘indulgence’, or merely ‘the absence of work’. In an ‘always on’ society, to stand still is a waste of time. It’s why I love the expanded definition that Margareta Asp, a professor in ‘caring science’ at Mälardalen University in Sweden, developed through her study on rest. She allows it the gravitas it deserves. “The essence of rest is an experience of harmony concerning one’s feelings, actions, and motivation,” she writes. It is “characterised by a sense of confidence and trust in one’s own inviolable human dignity and in being loved.” Asp reminds us that rest is more than physical recuperation — it is spiritually replenishing and life-affirming. When we are free from external demands, even if only temporarily, we can reorient ourselves to live in accordance with our own values.

Contrary to popular thought, this definition incorporates an element of activeness within the idea of rest. Asp tells us that “rest comprises its duality — ‘non rest’. It is a rhythm between these two human conditions… driven by human’s motivation to take responsibility and to search for meaning, in every new moment of life…” Even when we are still, we are moving. Author and strong proponent of the four-day work week Alex Soojug-Kim Pang, likewise states that rest and work are two sides of the same coin, that “neither can exist without the other.” Pang frames rest as an opportunity, pointing to studies which show our brains hard at work even while daydreaming or ‘doing nothing’, working away at problems in the background. It’s why we might find our ‘aha!’ moment during a shower, or right before we drift off to sleep. If we let our minds wander, it finds chances to connect the dots.

But perhaps we should take the focus off productivity all together. Rest is a form of maintenance, as artist Jenny Odell points out in her book How to Do Nothing, and that is worth valuing in and of itself: “[W]e inhabit a culture that privileges novelty and growth over the cyclical and regenerative. Our very idea of productivity is premised on the idea of producing something new, whereas we do not tend to see maintenance and care as productive in the same way.” To see care as a form of respite also allows us to graciously accept help from those around us, and to reciprocate in ways that lighten the load, whether it be in offering meals, babysitting or general life admin.

If you have trained yourself to operate on minimal time off and maximal stimulation, leisure can feel alien, frightening even. At my most burnt out, my mind and body were ground to a fine dust. I was exhausted yet jittery and restless on days off, my nervous system a wreck. It got worse when the outside world suddenly felt too loud; I began jumping at shadows. Therapy helped, but ultimately my way out was to quit and not work for seven months. It’s not an option for everyone, of course, but for me, it was this experience of deliberately disconnecting from my day to day that gifted me the opportunity to heal, travel, spend time with loved ones and remember what I hold dear in life (it isn’t careerism). I felt human again, awed by art and nature. I felt myself soften and become more attuned to beauty in all its forms. I felt a deep sense of being in the world. And I wish everyone, in some form or other, the same opportunity.

I wasn’t compelled, though, to remain in my state of refuge. I didn’t want to escape to a tropical paradise forever. My break felt galvanising, just as Asp had alluded to, the same thought echoed in Odell’s How to Do Nothing. In recounting Thomas Merton’s book of essays Contemplation in a World of Action, Odell writes that “removal and contemplation were necessary… but that same contemplation would always bring one back around to their responsibility to and in the world.” 

Sometimes, rest is simply the joy of escapism. “When I think of escapism done well, I think of queer clubbing culture,” Amedi reflects. “Trans and queer people have used music, art, dance to imagine what it feels to be fully present and our most authentic selves. Escaping over-policing, housing crisis and discrimination to feel and embody pleasure and connection. Having those moments can give us the somatic understanding of what we’re building for, so we will recognise what it feels like when we get there.” When we zoom out, we see that the work of rest is political and the supporting infrastructure needs to be expansive, spanning from labour rights to affordable childcare, access to recreational spaces, environmental protections, healthcare, transport and more. Amedi reiterates that the rest deficit is a structural issue, not an individual one. “Thirty years of wage stagnation, union-busting laws, destruction of our social safety net and ecocide. We have to counteract the forces of neoliberalism by finding common ground and working together. In the meantime, we can learn a lot from communal Indigenous cultures, disability justice and anarchist mutual aid principles.”

Building the sustained energy for collective movements is a sentiment which underscores Odell’s treatise on ‘doing nothing’. Her book, not a self-help manual for relaxation, but rather a manifesto on divesting from tech’s hyper-individualistic visions, encourages us to turn our heads from productivity culture and towards our natural environments — starting with something as small as noticing the plants that thrive nearby. Truly seeing our ecosystems, she posits, can become devotion to them, can grow to being in relationship with all living things, can lead, ultimately, to a collective responsibility to care for one another.

It makes me think of hiking up the mountain that day. Every step in an unfamiliar environment asked for my undivided attention, it demanded it from me. The mountain made me notice bird calls, the way the light hits treetops, which paths snaked to which directions. I felt time slow, still, expand, collapse in and whoosh out again. In a world which moves at warp speed, slowing down and standing still is the spanner we throw into the machine. It can fortify our mind and body. It honours the time we’ve spent on earth. It makes space for deep thinking, and provides a conduit for exploration and change. This is what I think of when I think of rest.