A recent post on social media hit me all wrong, and invited me into deeper listening to what matters to me. It was in response to the feeling expressed by many in my life about being exhausted by everything life asks of us. The response started out with “Tiredness is a deception,” and went on to explain that God has given us everything we need to “do what He has called us to do”.
Before I go any further, I do want to be clear that when I re-read the post, I appreciated what the author had to say about making choices in how we spend our energy so that we can attend to what is important to us, taking time for rest and renewal, and being willing to say ‘no’ to what is not ours to do.
However, the phrase “tiredness is a deception” stirs reactivity in me.
First of all, it echoes the brand of Christianity I was raised with that taught both explicitly and implicitly that experiencing normal human feelings was somehow a failing on my part, that discouragement, sadness and exhaustion were just “lies from the devil”. In other words, uncomfortable feelings weren’t true, that spiritual maturity required that I “overcome”, “push through”, and most importantly, ignore any inner response that got in the way of my being joyful, peaceful and able to just keep being productive.
Secondly, it suggests that the normal feelings of being human are somehow not true. This is how burnout happens—when I ignore the signals from my heart and my body that I need to rest, that I need to offer myself some intensive self-care.
I think this is where my reactivity came from. Calling tiredness “a deception” makes weariness sound like a failing on my part. It causes me to try to push myself to be different, to berate myself for “being deceived”.
It has taken a few days of pondering and reflection to feel into the Truth behind this post.
Tiredness, exhaustion, weariness are all very true, very much part of our human experience. They are very important signals to which we need to attend. They are invitations to meet ourselves with all the compassion we try to show to others.
And … they don’t need to be indications that we should give up trying to make a difference in the world, that ongoing, intense personal difficulty is just too hard to meet. (The author of the post made this point well.)
Life is Hard. Really hard. So many people I really care about are dealing with circumstances that are overwhelmingly difficult. Politics, economic realities, international events and climate disasters add layers to the burdens we all carry.
And it is also true that giving up isn’t an option. We have to keep showing up for the commitments we’ve made, the people we love, the causes that pull at our hearts.
There is Help available to us. We have the power to choose where we expend our energy. We can allow our weariness to remind ourselves that when life is hard, we need more rest, not less. We can choose to allow our hearts to be touched by the care and compassion of others. We can remember the practices that connect us to the care and wisdom of the Divine. We can choose to seek out beauty, and rest, and play.
Both are true … we are weary, some days to the breaking point. And Love has not left us alone in our struggles. Grace is there to help us keep going when all we want to do is quit.
This is the contemplative way. Not either/or, but both/and. This is Love.
Leave a Reply