Sometimes slowing down is exactly what you need.
Sweet friend, can I ask you something?
When is the last time you truly rested?
Not just sat down for a few minutes between tasks. Not scrolled through your phone while half-watching TV. Not collapsed into bed so exhausted that sleep came before your head even hit the pillow. I mean truly, genuinely, intentionally rested. The kind of rest where your body relaxes, your mind gets quiet, and your soul actually gets to breathe for a little while.
If you’re having trouble remembering — this post is for you.
And if that question just made you feel a tiny twinge of guilt — sweet friend, that right there tells me everything. Because somewhere along the way, most of us picked up a belief that we were never meant to carry:
The belief that rest is something we have to earn.
The Lie We’ve Been Told
We live in a world that is absolutely obsessed with busy.
Think about it. When someone asks how you’re doing, what do the most common answers sound like? “Oh, I’ve just been so busy.” “Crazy busy, but good!” “Exhausted, but keeping up!” And we say these things almost proudly — like being run-down and overwhelmed is a sign that we are doing life right.
We glorify the hustle. We celebrate the grind. We wear our exhaustion like a badge of honor and quietly judge ourselves — and sometimes each other — for daring to slow down.
And the result? We have an entire generation of women who are burned out, depleted, running on fumes, and wondering why they feel so disconnected from the joy and peace that God promised them.
Sweet friend, I want to gently suggest something today.
Maybe the problem isn’t that you need to try harder. Maybe the problem is that you need to rest more.
What God Actually Says About Rest
Here’s something that stops me in my tracks every single time I think about it.
In the very first pages of the Bible — in Genesis, when God was creating the entire universe — He rested on the seventh day. The God who spoke light into existence, who separated the waters, who breathed life into the first human being — He rested.
Not because He was tired. God doesn’t get tired. But because He was showing us something deeply, profoundly important from the very beginning:
Rest is not an afterthought. Rest is part of the design.
He didn’t rest on the seventh day because He ran out of things to do. He rested intentionally, purposefully — and then He called that day holy. Set apart. Sacred. He literally built rest into the rhythm of creation and called it good.
And then in Exodus, when He gave His people the Ten Commandments, He didn’t say “try to rest when you can” or “rest is nice if you have time.” He said remember the Sabbath. Keep it. Honor it. Protect it.
Rest wasn’t a suggestion. It was a commandment.
So if you’ve been feeling guilty for needing rest — if you’ve been pushing through exhaustion and telling yourself you’ll slow down “someday when things calm down” — I want you to hear this:
Needing rest doesn’t make you weak. It makes you human. And God designed it that way on purpose.
Jesus and the Art of Slowing Down
One of the things I love most about Jesus is how completely countercultural He was — and still is.
He lived in one of the busiest, most politically charged, most demanding seasons imaginable. People needed Him everywhere He went. There were sick people to heal, crowds to teach, disciples to guide, religious leaders to navigate. The needs were endless and urgent and real.
And yet — Jesus rested.
He slipped away to quiet places to pray. He got in a boat and fell asleep in the middle of a storm. He sat at a table and shared long, unhurried meals with people He loved. He pulled away from the crowds when His soul needed to be refueled.
If the Son of God — the One who came to save the entire world — made rest a regular, intentional part of His life, what does that tell us?
It tells us that rest is not a luxury for people who have nothing important to do. Rest is a discipline practiced by people who have everything important to do — and who are wise enough to know they cannot do it without being refueled.
The Empty Cup Nobody Talks About
Sweet friend, you cannot pour from an empty cup.
I know you know this. Most of us know this. And yet we keep trying, don’t we? We keep giving and serving and doing and showing up — for our families, our jobs, our communities, our friends — and we keep wondering why we feel so hollow inside. Why the joy feels thin. Why we snap at the people we love the most. Why even the things we used to love start to feel like just one more thing on the list.
That is not a character flaw. That is an empty cup.
And an empty cup doesn’t need more willpower. It doesn’t need a better schedule or a more detailed to-do list or another cup of coffee. It needs to be filled. Intentionally. Regularly. Without guilt.
Rest is how we fill back up.
Real rest — the kind that actually restores us — looks different for everyone. For some of us it’s a quiet morning with our Bible and a cup of coffee before anyone else wakes up. For some of us it’s a walk outside where we can hear the birds and feel the sun and remember that the world is bigger than our to-do list. For some of us it’s a nap, a long bath, an afternoon with a good book, or an evening doing absolutely nothing productive and not apologizing for it.
Whatever it looks like for you — it is not selfish. It is not lazy. It is not irresponsible.
It is necessary. And it is holy.
When Rest Is an Act of Faith
Here’s the part that I think is the most beautiful of all.
Sometimes resting is the most faithful thing we can do.
Because when we rest — truly rest, intentionally rest — we are saying something with our actions that is very hard to say with our words. We are saying “God, I trust You. I trust that the world will keep turning without me holding it together for a few hours. I trust that You are working even when I am still. I trust that my worth is not measured by my productivity.”
Psalm 46:10 says “Be still and know that I am God.”
Not “be busy and know that I am God.” Not “hustle harder and know that I am God.” Be still. In the stillness, in the quiet, in the rest — that is often where we hear His voice most clearly. That is where He does some of His most tender, most transformative work in our hearts.
Slowing down is not giving up on God. Sometimes slowing down is how we finally get close enough to hear what He’s been trying to say all along.
A Gentle Invitation
Sweet friend, I want to leave you with this today.
You have permission to rest. Not because you’ve earned it. Not because everything on your list is finished — because let’s be honest, the list is never really finished. But because you are a human being made in the image of a God who rested, and rest is written into the very fabric of who you are.
So today — just today — I want to invite you to do one thing. Pick one small act of rest and actually do it without guilt. Put your feet up for twenty minutes. Sit on the porch and just listen to the birds. Close your eyes and breathe and let God fill up the quiet places in your soul.
You are not falling behind by resting. You are not letting anyone down.
You are taking care of the one person God specifically put you in charge of taking care of — yourself. And that, sweet friend, is not weakness.
That is wisdom. 💜
With so much love, Marilyn Finding Life’s Magic
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