We all hear about the Sabbath and as moms, we are like, “Sure! When will we find this magical day of rest from our lives??” Because rest sounds good, but there are still kids here asking me for snacks and to play with them!
This past weekend I had one of the most restful days I’ve ever had. It inspired me to share this episode (as I hit record planning to talk about something totally different) and tell you the ways that rest has refreshed me and why I encourage you to do it too!
To me, this day of rest came about from the overwhelming need to address some emotions that were piling up for me (I needed to feel my feelings!). I needed a day to listen to my body and listen to God.
So I put everything on the back burner and had a day of BEING STILL, rather than DOING ALL THE THINGS!
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THE IMPORTANCE OF FAMILY RHYTHMS
In our home we fall into natural FAMILY RHYTHMS, it is how things get done. And one of our rhythms for a few years has been Church and Chill on Sundays.
This gives us the framework to make space in our week for the things we value – even if we are still learning to appreciate them and do them well.
A day of rest has been one of those things.
WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO REST
When we spend a day of rest, we get a chance to listen closer to our life, our bodies, to God
It also helps us to come out of the constant stress response we have been operating in. When we are stressed we are flooded with stress hormones and even using a different part of our brain. We need to find ways to come down from that stress response by letting our body feel like it is safe, so it can cue the brain to chill out.
A day of rest lets your body move out of operating in a stress mode.
It also gives you energy for the week ahead. I felt like I rested until I felt restless (which is rare of a Type 9).
TEACHING OUR KIDS TO REST
Resting is a skill and it is one we can teach our kids too.
This doesn’t mean we roll into a Sunday telling our kids they are on their own – but to walk alongside them in learning how to do it.
BECAUSE IT ISN’T COMFORTABLE
Just BEING for a day won’t feel comfortable. It might even feel boring. But God calls us to it and it is worth making it a practice for your soul to be refreshed.
CHOOSE THINGS THAT REFRESH YOU
Pay attention to how you get rest. Avoid things that actually drain you even though they don’t require a lot of energy (ahem, social media!).
The full transcript is available at the end of this post.
FUN LINKS FROM THE EPISODE
Sign up for Simple Saturdays (the virtual coffee date with me that comes out twice a month)
Check out Stef Gass (Mompreneur Mastermind podcast)
Saturday morning chores (the episode on how we started them in our home)
Family Rhythms (what ours are, and worksheets to make your own)
The Enneagram (I talk about it a lot, here are the basics)
Two episodes on mindset shifts that can help moms of babies and toddlers (episode 73 and episode 74)
The free printable of mindset shifts to empower your motherhood (get them right here)
Say HAAAAY on Instagram
Join the Simple Squad in the FB Community Group
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FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Hey friends! It’s Shawna, your nerdy girlfriend, and life coach from simple purpose.ca. Welcome to the simple on purpose podcast here for moms like you, who want to have the reminder, and the encouragement that it is okay to simplify- it is okay to slow down and it is important to show up for your life on purpose.
That’s what we are here to talk about. Welcome. I’m glad you’re here. I am Shawna. I am a mom of three, a life coach, and you might know me from the simple on purpose dot ca blog. That’s where I’ve been for about six or seven years before that if you were like an OG blog reader, remember dovetail blog, that was way back in the day. And there was also that period of time where I was at home with three kids. I had all three kids within three and a half years, and I just could not keep up with blogging. And I told you guys, I’m just going to send you guys emails twice a month. Simple Saturdays were born from that. Simple Saturdays,I’ve been running, I think for about five years now. And that is one of the most heartwarming things that I do where I email you every two weeks. And you guys call it your virtual coffee date with me, and there’s thousands of you. And I love it. When you email me back, I had so many people email me back this weekend and it was so relaxing to sit and read through what people have written me, their ideas, their suggestions, their feedback. It just felt like the coffee date was reciprocated. I love when that happens. If you are not part of simple Saturdays, why not? You should stop by the show notes and sign up for that.
This weekend I’m recording on a Monday. This weekend was true rest for me. How often does this really happen? Not often. So I started a mastermind and the woman leading the mastermind, Stephanie gas, you should go check her out. She’s so inspiring. And one of the biggest things she’s inspired me to do is go off social on the weekends. It’s something that I don’t do a lot of on the weekends, but enough that it could easily take over my Saturday, take over my Sunday. My phone is always beside me. I’m just reaching for it and just hearing her do it herself. Like she deletes the apps. It just reminded me that that is what I want. I’m going to, I’m going to try that this weekend. So I’ve been working on that and I wouldn’t say I’ve cut it out a hundred percent. I’ve probably cut it 80%, which feels like a win. And it feels like I’m unhooking from it. And that feels freeing.
In our house we have natural rhythms. So on a Saturday we will usually do Saturday morning chores. There’s an episode on that. I’ll link it in the show notes. And then we kind of just do something for the day. Like go somewhere, see somebody do something. Sundays are a protected space. There are a protected day. We call it church and chill. And since we aren’t going to church in person, we watch, um, different church things on YouTube. We talk about it. We have a treat as a family. This is like Sunday school for kids. And they actually really love it. We’re having some of the most engaging conversations we’ve ever had with me and the kids. My husband doesn’t go to church. So this is like a me and the kids thing.
And the other part of it chill. Like they want to watch TV, go ahead, watch TV. I don’t really care. The doors are open. The neighborhood kids are in and out. Like, it’s just super chill. I’m not gonna be doing a lot of things or going a lot of places. We might go for a walk to the park, but I don’t put any expectations on myself. Like not even for dinner, it’s usually soup or last night it was breakfast. I made crepes and potatoes.
And I just want that day to be a time of nourishment and rest. And yesterday I felt like I finally got it. I finally got the day of rest and the day was going as normal. Like we had watched church and the kids are hanging out there’s music playing. They have torn apart the living room and turned it into a Nerf fortress. And I’m just like skirting around it, trying to be like, it’s cool. It’s cool. I’m chill, whatever.
But I had some news that day and it was upsetting. And the conversation left me feeling sad. And I am really working on letting myself feel my feelings. I know it sounds like something you learned in elementary school. It turns out it’s not guys, adults have problems doing this. This is something I coach on as well, especially in the life on purpose Academy, we spent a whole month on coping with negative emotions, processing your feelings, letting yourself feel your feelings.
So I had a day. I had a day of this. I cried. I sat in the tub and cried. I read, I journaled my prayers. I went for a walk. All of these I did with my kids, except for the crying and the tough part. They were playing we for that time of the day. And I just told them guys like, I’m feeling kind of sad today, let’s go for a walk and I’m just going to take some space, guys. I’m going to feel my feelings. I didn’t want this to become an exercise in them, trying to cheer me up or think they did something wrong. I just really let them know what was going on. That was upsetting to me that we can be sad when sad things happen and they were super cool and supportive about it. They were very loving and empathetic and they carried on with their day, which I was happy for that. They don’t have to be sad if I’m sad, they can just move on.
So I was going to record a whole different podcast, but I just really want to encourage you to have a day of rest. This is what God calls us to do. He calls us to have a day of rest. And in order to do that, it feels like we’re sacrificing something. We need to lay down our agenda. We need to lay down social media. We need to lay down the chores, the chores, the chores. We need to turn it all off. We had like, we just need to unplug things and plug ourselves from the external world, unplug ourselves from expectations and just be, just be instead of do all the time. So sorry, if you can hear my furnace going in and out, I’m in Canada, it’s cold here. Got to keep warm, gotta keep these podcasters warm in Canada. So you’re gonna listen to their furnaces Probably.
It is so important to rest. And while I was doing it, something that I’ve been reflecting on because we’ve been doing church and chill for a couple of years now, but I really feel like I’m getting it. And maybe I’m a slow learner. It is so important to just be still and listen, listen to your life. For me, I really needed a day to just listen to my body. Like what I’m feeling, where I’m feeling it, how I’m holding it, I’m holding the tension and listening to God. Like even though I wasn’t actively reading every verse in the Bible that day, it just felt like I was in it with him. Like in this day of rest, just talking to him throughout the day in my mind and offering things up to him, just listening.
Another huge part that I’m learning about resting is it turns off the stress cycle. When we are in a stress response, there’s chemicals flowing through our body. We’re using a different part of our brain and it is really easy to stay in that stress response. For some of us, we operate from that stress response for a lot of our day. And the more we do it, the more hard wired it gets. And we kind of are a constantly stressed out person. And our body has trouble finding that balance once again, to relaxation, to safety and peace. So having that day of rest, it’s reminding my body, my body I’m safe right now. I don’t have to release all these stress hormones. I can kind of turn on the brakes and just let my body be present with safety.
It really brings you into the present too, right? Because when we’re in the stress response, we’re constantly thinking about what’s going to go wrong. We’re thinking about the future and planning ahead, but it’s a day of presence is a day of just showing up in your home with your people and yourself. And you know what I felt at the end of the day, like I had almost too much rest. I sat with my kids. I sit with them each night when we tuck them in. And I was talking to my son, my oldest, he’s nine about this day of rest that I had and how he’s like, yeah, it’s kind of fun to rest. And I’m like, yeah. And then you rest enough that you’re ready to go. I feel like I’ve rested enough that I became restless, ready to start the week, ready to dig into things like I didn’t want to rest anymore. I felt like, okay, that was, that was more than enough. Now I’m ready. Which as a type nine, I think is a very rare place to get. If you know the Enneagram, I’m a type nine, we can just rest all the time. It’s kind of like the sloth is an animal that is used to represent the Enneagram type nine. Often.
The other thing that I’m noticing is that a day of rest teaches our kids to rest teaches kids that rest is okay, it’s acceptable, it’s healthy. And for me over the years, I’ve had to teach them ways to do that. Like listening to music or watching TV or go have like a huge bubble bath. And they really need us at first to do things with them rather than expecting them to just figure it out on their own. Like it’s a skill to learn how to arrest. Like what can we do together? We can read together, I can get down and play Lego with you. I also read of a mom who had a Sunday basket and that was special stuff that her kids get to have just on Sundays. Like things that were just restful, like activity books and coloring and different toys and stuff like that. Because when you have kids, you’re probably like, well, how do I rest with kids around? They need things. I have to feed them. And it’s going to get easier as they get older, for sure.
But some other things that can help you is to talk to them about what you’re doing and why to plan some things like plan out what you’re going to have for dinner and to still show up for them. This, this is a day more about me releasing myself of expectations rather than me trying to have a day off from life. Like it’s, it’s definitely a balance between the two. So we are still showing up for snacks and play and we’re helping them with things. But for me, I find that I’m just doing it without as much of a chip on my shoulder. I’m doing it without all the expectations, because when you can lower your expectations, you can lower the need to do to constantly do. And it’s not about just giving up on life and like living like a slop or a day. I mean, maybe that would be a healthy challenge for you to try out, depending on where you fall on how serious you take doing and doing, but just allowing yourself to be, just be for a date and it’s can be really uncomfortable.
There are parts of the day that might even feel boring. Isn’t it fascinating that God calls us to this. Like really? Isn’t it fascinating that this is actually a practice for our soul, that this is going to refresh our soul, this discomfort and this boredom and this tension that we feel of, like, I need to go do all these things, but I also need to rest. So this has been kind of a few years in the making of a me embracing a day of rest learning about how to really get rested. Like what’s going to make me feel rested. What will make me feel really nourished so that I can show up tomorrow ready for the week ahead, feeling like I have energy instead of doing things that actually kind of drained it somehow.
So for me getting off social media, it’s a big help having low expectations on what I’m doing. Kind of letting myself stick around home, letting my kids do things that they find restful. Even if it means more TV than usual, keeping food, super simple. These are all things that help me have a day of rest. So I hope this podcast has encouraged you to put a day of in your home, whatever day of the week is going to work for you guys as a family. And if you do have super small kids at home, this is an ease into it. You don’t have to figure out how to make this day. Feel restful in the midst of babies and toddlers, like go back and listen to those two episodes on the emotional struggles of having babies and toddlers. There’s also a printable PDF that I forgot to mention in the episode, but I put all of the mindset shifts in motherhood that have helped me into a PDF.
So I’ll link that in the show notes as well. If you want to go back and listen to those podcast episodes, I’ll put those in the show notes to the show notes. They’re like this little box of all these ideas and all these little nuggets. So I hope you stop by and check those out. All right. So this is the podcast episode. I didn’t know I was recording, but here we are. This is what you got. I hope that it has been helpful for you. I hope that it was appropriate of me to kind of forget my content plan for today and just speak to you from my heart from what’s been going on in my life and sharing that with you. I hope it has helped you somehow. And I would love to hear from you if it did. I love hearing from you guys find me on instagram @simpleonpurpose.ca Send me a message there or even better Talk to me in the Facebook group.
The Facebook group is our own space for the simple on purpose community. Right now, we’ve been talking about this simplify for fall challenge sharing. What’s going on with that there. And it’s just your place to come ask questions, share your takeaways, share your struggles. It’s a place to get support. So stop by and join that group. If you are on Facebook and Facebook is your thing, we’ve got a really great community of women there. They are called the simple squad and they are women moms like you, who are looking for ways to show up and live intentionally and simplify their lives. All right, the furnace is coming back on. That’s pretty much my cue to say goodbye to you guys. Thank you for being here. I hope you have a great week.
