Learning to Rest

Today I remind myself of the need to listen, to feel what my body is telling me; to not ignore the signs of sickness, and fatigue. I am reminded that I am human, and therefore not indestructible. As I filter through my morning routine I can’t help but pause. The world as we know it has taught us to ignore the needs of our bodies, our souls, and our minds.

Last night I found myself in urgent care, I was sick. I have been for the past 3–4 days but as many of you know, at least those here in corporate America, we have this thing called sick time and we only get so much of it. So like many of us, I have been hoarding my sick time, mostly because I don’t have a whole lot of it; 8 hours to be precise. Why? For one simple reason, I don’t want to get fired. The thing about sick time is you can only call in sick if you have it. So what happens if you don't, well you get written up. Two writes equals a warning and a third means you are out of a job.

Why does this matter? I am sure some of you are sitting here going, “ Yeah, that’s how that works.” This isn’t news. It matters because as trivial as it sounds, that fear of not wanting to get written up, or not wanting to waste your sick time leads many to ignore the signs of sickness in favor of going in to work. Resulting in a disconnect. We stop listening. We stoping giving our bodies what they need, and eventually maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow our bodies will have no choice but to stop us.

I should know because mine did. It landed me in a hospital and sentenced me to 2 years of medical tests, and doctor appointments because I refused to listen.

I know I can’t change the way the world works, and as one human's soul, I can’t make the millions of corporations that hire us understand the damaging effects of this policy. I know that. But I can remind you to listen, to take time for yourself even if it is just five minutes. To encourage you not to horde that sick time, to take rest when you need it.

Re-learning to listen to our bodies is hard; especially in a society where productivity is favored over well-being.