I have previously written about how much Tricia Hersey’s book Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto has spoken to me. (Here is the list of simple rest practices I developed for Lent after I read it.) This rest is faithful. It is what we need for our own wellbeing. And it is a tool for liberation. Last week I expanded on these thoughts with a piece at Baptist News Global. Click here to read “The rest we must have.”

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash.

Recently I read Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia Hersey, who is popularly known as the Nap Bishop. Hersey makes the case that all of us are caught up in grind culture, which is a hyperfocus on productivity around which our entire lives are oriented. Grind culture feeds and feeds on many modes of dehumanization: white supremacy, patriarchy, ableism, individualism, and more. It makes us think that we are what we produce. It causes us to see rest as a reward that we can only claim when we have worn ourselves down to a nub. It keeps us stepping on one another to get ahead. And it is killing us physically (as seen by our collective sleep deficit) as well as mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and relationally.

Hersey says that our response to grind culture’s demands that we do more must be to rest. Rest includes but is not limited to sleep. It can be anything that helps us slow down, replenish, and reconnect with ourselves, one another, and God. It can be lengthy, but it can also be a series of shorter breaks. I often hear from coachees that they struggle to find time for rest. That is largely because of the overlapping issues named above, and it is partly the result of grind culture’s drain on our creativity. It’s hard to come up with ways to rest that fit the moment when we are already so very tired.

With that in mind, I have developed a list of practices that offer rest. I stopped at 40 because that is the number of days in Lent, not counting Sundays. If you choose, you can take on a rest practice each day as a Lenten observance. Let me be clear, though, that I don’t intend these practices as 40 more to-dos to pile on your already-full plate. (That would defeat the purpose!) They are intended simply to give you ideas for some easily accessible breaks if you don’t have the mental space to come up with a means to get some much-needed rest. Click here to download the list. Feel free to print and/or share it.

Stay tuned for an article that elaborates on how rest doesn’t just cause us to feel better and more present but also equips us to push back on dehumanizing forces.

You’ve almost made it! That promise of extended leave in order to rejuvenate and to reconnect with God and others is just around the corner. Maybe you are army crawling toward your departure date. Maybe you have concerns about being away from your congregation during a pandemic, as conflict simmers, or with a big event or part of a significant planning process overlapping with your leave. Whether you are looking toward your respite with desperation, hesitation, or another emotion (or combination of emotions) entirely, I highly encourage you to take the breather and to think through all the pieces of getting ready, being gone, and re-entering your context.

That’s why I have created Hitting the Refresh Button: A Workbook to Help Clergy Plan for Renewal Leave. This 38-page PDF workbook helps you notice the current states of yourself and your congregation and name your hopes for what you’d like them to be after you take some time apart. The included reflection prompts then help you identify the scaffolding for a leave that will bridge the gap between what is and what could be. Details that are covered include framing, timing, identifying needed resources, budgeting, communicating with the church, departing well, checking in with yourself mid-leave, preparing for coming back, and much more.

The Church, your church, and the world need you at your best. That means we need you physically rested, spiritually grounded, and emotionally nurtured, whether or not we do a good job of telling you this! Hitting the Refresh Button could be the guide you’ve been seeking to get you there during your renewal leave. Purchase it for $15 here.

A few weeks ago I went on retreat with my four best friends, women I met in seminary before any of us had significant others, kids, or “Rev.” in front of our names. These are the people who finally busted me out of round-the-clock study mode – a habit fueled by perfectionist tendencies and the need to achieve – with their invitations to sing karaoke, watch so-good-it’s-bad tv, and eat cheese dip. (I am forever grateful to these friends. Without their intervention, I would likely be incapable of the self-care required by ministry and motherhood.) We have aspired to gather every year now that we are geographically scattered. We’ve missed some years due to church and family commitments, because we don’t retreat unless we can all be present. But especially as we’ve gotten older, life has become more complicated, and our kids have left diapers behind, we’ve moved our trip up the priority list.

Other than my husband, parents, and brother, these are the only people with whom I can totally take off the filter. They have known me half my life, so they take what I say in the context of 20 years of deep friendship. This is an incredible gift, because while I always want to be true to my values and act out of who I really am, there’s never a time when I don’t either choose my words carefully or spool through the tapes after conversations when I’m in ministry mode, wondering how certain statements will be or were taken. That pre- and post-thought takes a lot of mental and emotional energy, and I am grateful to get an extended break from it once each year.

If you’re a minister, I encourage you to make time for the people with whom you can take off the filter. Use technology as needed, but get in a room together when you can. It will do your heart and mind so much good. If you don’t have these unfiltered friends yet, carve out time and space to find some. They might turn up at a local hangout, beside you in a classroom, in a parenting group, or with a group of hobbyists or fans. It’s not easy finding friends as an adult – especially when you have a vocation that brings certain assumptions to mind in new acquaintances – but it’s worth the effort to know and be fully known by another. While these friends will likely beyond your ministry sphere, they will bolster your sustainability in ministry as much as (if not more than) any other kind of self-care.

Recently I was coaching a pastor who was two months into a new call. She was excited about her church and its mission potential. She was also enjoying getting to know the people, but she was having trouble trusting them. She was a bit befuddled by this, because there was no overt reason for this hesitation. She hadn’t received any hurtful criticism or significant pushback. When I asked what the lack of trust was about, she thought for a moment. She then named relational fatigue as a key factor. In this pastor’s case, she had taken a full month off – a typical fallow period – before diving into her new ministry. And yet she was recognizing that she needed more time to tend to her (understandably) tender heart after leaving behind parishioners that she loved.

This pastor had just provided perhaps the most powerful testimonial for taking ample time off between ministry positions. We often cite physical and spiritual exhaustion as the primary motivators for spacing out calls. But bringing closure to relationships with people we’ve walked alongside during their personal milestones, with whom we have dreamed and argued, and who have been present for our own ups and downs is hard, good work. It can be overwhelming to think about opening ourselves up to knowing and being known by a whole new congregation. And yet, the bedrock of strong connections is trust, which we do not lend or receive without the willingness to make ourselves at least a little vulnerable.

This is not to say that it’s easy to take long stretches between ministry positions. Personal financial pressures are real. Churches that have been in long search processes are eager for the uncertainty to end and the settled pastor to arrive. (Search teams in particular are known to apply pressure to be on site as soon as possible. After all, the team members know the incoming minister best and are most excited about her arrival!) The pastor herself is looking forward to a fresh start in a new setting. But before committing to a start date, consider not only what you need in terms of every manner of recovery, but also what time frame will allow you to enter the system with a readiness for mutual belonging. This is a mindset – a heart orientation – that attends to the long-term missional and financial health of both clergy and congregation.

If you are already in place and find yourself reluctant to trust even in the absence of conflict, then self-care is in order. When we are unable to risk exposure, whether we are new in a call or ten years into our tenure, we need time to rest. We need space for introspection. We need opportunities to view or create beauty. We need relief from the relentlessness of ministry. Because if we have not tended to our own inner lives, we will not be able to offer a quality of presence to others. And if we withhold, then we do not build trust and do not forge or maintain relationships that make bold ministry possible.

In the case of my coachee, we strategized ways to create space and clarity within her current personal and professional realities so that she could increase her capacity to trust. If you find yourself turning inward in your ministry setting, what changes do you need to make so that you can be the pastoral leader God has called you to be?

[Note: my coachee graciously granted me permission to share her story.]

Your alarm goes off. You groan and bury your face in your pillow. Is it morning already?

Your fatigued body slumps into bed, and you can barely work up the energy to pull up the covers. Meanwhile, your brain is on overdrive, trying to process everything that happened during the day and all the tasks that await you tomorrow.

Sound familiar? You’re not alone. Real rest can be hard to come by, making for a slow start to the day. Real exertion of every variety – part of the deal in ministry – is hard on the body, mind, and spirit, making for a fitful entrée to much-needed sleep. It’s a vicious cycle.

Starting and ending the day with intentionality can help you frame your day more positively (thus giving you energy) and end your day with gratitude (thus sending you off to quicker and more satisfying rest). These bookends don’t have to be lengthy or cumbersome. They just have to work for you. Here are some suggestions.

Starting the day

• Breathe deeply for 30 seconds before getting out of bed

• Do a 5-minute interval workout

• Decide on a focus word for your day that you can repeat to yourself as needed

• Smile at yourself in the mirror

• Speak aloud a sentence prayer as you cross the threshold of your home or office

• Refuse to look at your phone until you get to work

• Read a short devotional at your desk before you turn on your computer

Ending the day

• Utilize the examen

• Pray in color or doodle or write in a journal

• Identify a way you helped someone or grew as a person or pastor that day, then name and give thanks for a way someone helped you

• Mindfully stretch out your weary body and remember that you are wonderfully made

• Tell someone you love them, whether in person or by technology

• Create a short ritual of letting go of undone tasks or unmet expectations for the day

• Meditate for a couple of minutes or do a body scan once you’ve gotten in bed

You cannot control all the events of your day. Bookending your day with intentionality can help you control your responses and their effects on you, however, thereby enabling you to release what is not yours to worry about and guarding your body, heart, and mind from an unhealthy level of exhaustion.

What would you add to these lists, and what might you try to frame your day in a new way?

I have army-crawled toward vacation many times, so mentally and physically depleted that I wasn’t sure I’d cross the threshold before I collapsed from exhaustion. Those were hard starts to time away. They involved at least a couple of days to decompress and to get some semblance of energy back before I could really enjoy my respite. Then there was the anticipatory grief of re-entering “real life,” which cut short my fun on the back end and made me already start pining for my next vacation. This pattern held whether I was in a call I loved or one that made me want to hide under the covers.

Our beach trip three weeks ago was different. Beforehand, I had picked up several new coaching clients that I was eager to get started with. I had some projects I was looking forward to. I was feeling creative in my writing and planning. I was far from depleted. Still, I was glad to listen to crashing waves and spend concentrated time with my family. And I was ready to come back to work afterward.

This easy entry to and exit from time off is what I hope for you so that you can truly enjoy your hard-earned breaks, whether you have a grand adventure planned or intend to hole up at home with a stack of novels. Here are some coaching questions to help you work toward this reality:

• What must be taken care of before your mind can let go of work?

• Which of these tasks belong only to you, and which can others take on?

• How far out from vacation do you need to start tackling your list to give yourself enough time, pacing yourself so that you don’t start your time off in recovery mode?

• How will you give yourself grace if all the to-dos aren’t completed before your break?

• How might you ritualize closing up shop so that your heart and mind grasp that you are on respite?

• How will you acknowledge and then let go of work concerns as they (naturally) come to mind during your time away?

• How can you celebrate the end of your vacation and reorient toward work so that you are ready to get back to it?

• What will help you remember that you don’t have to do all the things on the first day you return to the office?

May your vacations be restful and rejuvenating. The church and world need you – particularly in this cultural and political moment – to be at your best.

My family and I just got back from a week at the beach. Thanks to our early-rising human alarm – for some reason my 3-year-old seems to think the day must start before 6:30 am – we took full advantage of the waves, a large pool, and a balcony that was great for picnics and reading and people-watching. We ate great seafood. We took naps. On the day it rained, we jumped until we were sore at a trampoline park.

I am very lucky in that going to the beach is nothing new. I have always lived within an eight-hour drive of one shore or another. When I was young, my parents took my brother and me to the Atlantic coast or the Gulf at least every other year. In nearly thirteen years of marriage, my husband and I have gotten away to the beach several times. That’s including the last three falls, now that we have a child who loves to be manhandled by the tide.

Yet something was different about this trip. I anticipated it. I enjoyed nearly every moment of it. And when it was over, I was happy to be coming home to my bed, my routine, my work. There was no dread about what awaited me. I didn’t open my email yesterday with one eye shut. I didn’t groan about the stacks of papers and books on my desk.

In other words, I needed – and had – a break, not an escape.

Too many times I’ve gone out of town in total denial about what I’d have to deal with when I got back. Church members gone wild. Staff conflict. Events that had to be pulled off, whether there was support and enthusiasm for them or not. I’ve dreamed about what it would look like just to stay gone.

Many of you have been there too. You survive until vacation, then your time away is not nearly enough to recover from the exhaustion and the discouragement. And sometimes all the quiet does is amplify the voice in your head that keeps asking if what you do makes any difference to anyone. (Spoiler alert: it does.)

So my hope for you is that your personal and vocational lives nourish you as much as they drain you so that, when you take that hard-earned time away, you just need a break instead of a full-on escape.