I’ve found myself mindlessly scrolling Twitter and Instagram when I feel too tired to follow a story — but that can feed into reading too much upsetting news and doesn’t really rest my brain, just kills time. Walking is great for mental fatigue, but sometimes I just want to be still.
A few ideas for other things to do this summer when my mind is tired and I want to do nothing:
- Lay down and chill out with the cats
- Put on an album and lounge on the couch listening
- Do a puzzle
- Photograph my garden
- Play with the cats
- Read a book of comic strips
- Watch a kid’s movie
- Take a nap
- Look at an art book
- Sit on the back deck and watch the wind in the trees
- Listen to some jazz or classical or ambient music
This Article was mentioned on cascadiainspired.com
This Article was mentioned on cascadiainspired.com
A cat at utter peace on my lap.
A stroll around the block with my husband, enjoying the petrichor from a light rain.
Looking up from my computer and catching the apricot-tinted sunset out my window.
As I try to find opportunities for good to come of this season of staying home (rather than focusing on what I’m missing out on), I’m trying to take more joy in the simple pleasures of summer, and life.
Today, that was eating cherries from my CSA while I read a photo journal of a photographer / climber’s mission to summit fifty peaks in North Cascades National Park in a year.
This weekend, maybe a tart made from fresh peaches and a day trip to the river in my husband’s hometown.
This summer is quieter than I would have planned, but instead of lamenting what could have been, I can revel in the fleeting gifts of the present.
Throughout my thirties, I’ve taken steps to simplify my life, and thought there wasn’t much more I could pare back, but now I’m seeing what simple really is. I grew up in a go-go-go household, so it’s taken a lot of work to release that mindset. Still, I have too many projects and interests to fill my day, and have to be intentional about resting and relaxing. And as summer passes quickly, I realize that in a typical year, we would have taken several weekend trips. Trips that require lots of research and coordination to pull off — burdens that I put on myself, from which I’ve been freed this summer.
I’ve been thinking lately about travel, and whether I take it for granted as an upper-middle-class American, and whether it’s worth the personal benefit to me when air travel especially contributes so dramatically to the climate crisis. This pause on travel is an opportunity to reevaluate our choices. We’ve toned down our flying the past few years, opting to take road trips through Canada for most of our longer vacations, but we still have an Alaska Airlines credit card to accumulate miles and get a discounted flight each year. While I enjoy exploring the world, I also wonder whether the ability to hop somewhere warm for a quick getaway excuses us from truly embracing the place where we live, and finding other ways to appreciate the place where we live. Whether relying on travel to inspire and rejuvenate us makes us devalue or miss inspiring places where we live, and not find ways to rest that are more sustainable. What wonderful things about our homes are we taking for granted, or missing altogether?
International travel and weekend getaways* seem de rigueur among my class, but most people in America and the world don’t have the means or flexibility for frequent or distant travel. Why would travel feel like a need for me, when most people cannot do it? What is the mindset of easy travel taking away from me?
As someone who tries to live intentionally, responsibly, and in tune with my ecoregion, taking this summer to try out not traveling is enlightening. I doubt we will completely stop flying since my family lives in California, but I can see a future where we focus much more on local exploration. And I am wondering whether we can find a healthier balance of enjoying the beautiful place we live, but also spending less energy and money “getting away” for a weekend.
The quiet, close-to-home life is valid, too. Right now, I am appreciating what it has to offer.
*There’s also something to be said about a work culture so exhausting that we feel the need for constant getaways.
About Tracy Durnell
Seattle-area graphic designer and SFF writer inspired by the Pacific Northwest, crafting a sustainable and intentional life. (she/her)
Bookmarked What Kind of Rest Do You Need? by Input/Output (Input/Output)
Seven types of rest:
Physical rest
Mental rest
Social rest
Creative rest
Emotional rest
Sensory rest
Spiritual rest
I’ve been thinking lately, too, about the length of rests we take. I’m currently self-employed (and what many would deem under-employed), leaving me relatively time-spacious weeks. Yet with several hours of mentally intensive work a day, and plenty of care work to run our household, I still often feel mentally tired by the end of the day.
This week I took my first “vacation” in at least six months, taking a four day weekend instead of two. (I might have taken a week or two around New Years 🤷♀️) You need both: regular periods of rest that happen multiple times a week (preferably daily), and longer periods of multiple connected days, less often (but probably more often than every six months 😉).
See also:
Smartphones consume rest
Defining rest
four kinds of real rest
Active processing tools: worksheets, notebooks, index cards, writing in different formats
Selection
Escape the feed and decide what to intake. Prompt yourself with new and different material.
Forms of curation
looking for recommendations from people I know or follow
browsing curated lists
considering what would be useful to learn now
choosing what to intake and ordering material
going deeper into a subject
investigating primary documents
deciding what to ignore
creating clusters to consume in tandem
Forms of exploration
explicitly trying new music, new artists, and new authors
looking at visual arts in books or online image databases (seeking inspiration beyond social media)
browsing, accepting serendipity
following curiosity paths
thinking about what sounds fun or exciting now
exploring online with friends
Intake
Build new routines or systems with intentional time to read, watch, and listen to what you’ve chosen.
Forms of intake
reading articles
reading books
looking up new words and concepts
listening to music
listening to podcasts
watching videos
Processing
Give yourself time and space to think about what you’ve consumed. Translate what you’ve learned into a useful or memorable format.
Forms of Passive processing
Allowing space to think about what I’ve taken in recently and soak in the vibes by not occupying my mind with some other form of intake while:
walking
exercising
cooking
baking
gardening
showering
lounging around
Forms of Active processing
Considering what I’ve taken in through active engagement with it:
blogging
creating notes
organizing info in excel
brainstorming / braindumping / making lists
exercises / worksheets
talking ideas through with friends
Forms of review
looking back at notes to reinforce them
telling friends about what I’ve read
writing book reviews
noticing what caught my attention or surprised me
foraging for insights
Integration and Transformation
Find synergies, make connections, and document incremental changes in your thinking. Create new works informed or inspired by what you consumed.
Forms of synthesis
adding cross-references between past notes and ideas
identifying connections between ideas and extrapolating further
applying ideas to my current projects
applying thoughts and lessons to my Big Questions
Forms of Creation
crafting a longer, more comprehensive blog post in response to things I’ve recently learned and thoughts I’ve had, adding analysis and enriching with depth, turning synthesis into something sharable and additive
writing prose (fiction or non-fiction)