SPEAKER_01 0:00

If you are in one place and you desire to be somewhere else, then see that. Visualize actually earning the position that you want. See the house where you want to live. See the vacations you want to take. All of those things are part of your mental rest.

SPEAKER_00 0:35

But the more I grow, the more I think. It's not a whole day. I find a fine. It's fine to be in my own name. Becoming serene.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

Hello, beautiful, and welcome to another episode of Becoming Serene, a podcast created just for you, those of us who want to embrace peace and our pursuit of purpose. On this podcast, we talk about faith, family, and focus. And I am your host, Ruth Serene Devonet Southall. So I have a question. Why has exhaustion now become normalized? Like, why is everyone just so exhausted? I remember a time when everyone was just so busy. I'm busy, you busy, we busy, everyone's busy. But now I'm exhausted. You know why? Because the stresses of this life are just compounded, one thing after another. Work, life, home, school, the children's, their school, their work, their lives, their extracurricular activities. Just everything comes all on top of one another and cause us to be excessively stressed. And you know why? Because we don't take the time to rest. Think about it. When was the last time you rested? Truly rested. I don't mean slept, you know, 10 hours, 12 hours. Whew. I would love to do that. I just thought about it for a quick second. But do you even know how many hours of sleep you need to be charged to like get your energy up? All of these things are so important, especially as women. Women, you know I'm talking to you. Fellas, if you're watching, thank you. But ladies, I am talking to you. I'm always talking to you. I'm here for you. I'm here for us to remind you of how important it is for you to take your rest. No one's gonna give it to you. And if they do, please thank them. Because, baby, that's rare. I can't remember the last time. I think the last time somebody told me to take some rest, I was pregnant. And my children are both in their 20s, so just imagine. So, why is rest important? Well, for one, like I said, it recharges you. And there are many, many different times, uh types of rest, but I want to first tell you how important rest is. If you are anything like me and you began your day with consulting God on his plan for your life, that means reading his word and spending time to just be still and silent. That's a form of rest. Some people call it meditation, so okay, let's call it meditation, but it is so important to begin every single day with stillness. If you watch my last episode, I talked about how I practice something called a miracle morning, and that also begins with silence and just being still. So I want to read um Psalm 62 to you. It reads, Truly, my soul finds rest in God. My salvation comes from him. Truly, he is my rock and my salvation, he is my fortress. I will never be shaken. How long will you assault me? Would all of you throw me down this leaning wall, this tottering fence? Surely they intend to topple me from my lofty place. They take delight in lies. With their mouths they bless, but in their hearts they curse. Yes, my soul finds rest in God. My hope comes from him. Truly, he is my rock and my salvation, he is my fortress. I will not be shaken. My salvation and my honor depend on God. He is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust in him at all times, you people. Pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge. Surely the lowborn are but a breath. The highborn are but a lie. If weighed on a balance, they are nothing. Together they are only a breath. Do not trust in exortion or put vain hope in stolen goods. Though your riches increase, do not set your heart on them. One thing God has spoken, two things I have heard. Power belongs to you, God, and with you, Lord, is unfailing love. And you reward everyone according to what they have done. Yes, I am talking about rest that you can only find in God and the hope in that sacred rest. Hello, beautiful. Thank you so much for joining me for another episode of Becoming Serene. If you have not subscribed yet, please hit that button right now. And don't forget to hit the notification bell so that you are notified whenever new episodes drop. And if you are truly, truly enjoying this, please shared with someone else who is also embracing peace in their pursuit of purpose, just like we are. So thank you so much again as we continue our journey together of becoming serene. Last year I actually studied rest uh for a number of weeks, and it talked about sacred rest, it talked about soul rest, and it talked about the sacred Sabbath. God has called us to rest so that we can rest in him, and once again, he can continue to establish our steps and order our plans that he has for our lives. So, resting, how does that look? When we think about rest, most people think about the physical state of rest, which is important because we do. You need to rest for a number of reasons. Of course, for your focus, um, your stamina, your physical energy, all of these things. And you cannot continue on and on and on day after day and think that you'll be able to be at your peak performance without proper rest. And that's why I asked earlier: do you know how much rest you need to be at your best every day? I happen to just realize I need a good seven hours. Seven hours between six and a half, seven hours, I know I am ready for the day. Anything less than that, I'm going to drop midday. And that's okay. Well, at least it's okay with me. Some people find it very strange that I can take a nap or I could fall asleep anywhere. I believe I may have mentioned on here and probably uh just in storytelling in my everyday life, but I was getting dental service and they were drilling, drilling my tooth, drilling, and I took a nap. I had anesthesia, of course. But they asked, how was your, you know, your procedure and is everything okay? And I said I slept. So I don't know if that's a testament to how great you are or just how easily I can rest. Can you rest in times when no one else can even fathom something like that? Because I have friends who are deathly afraid of going to the dentist, let alone sleeping in the chair. So physical rest is extremely important. Have you ever even thought about emotional rest? How important it is to sometimes just decompress and shut down, deep breathe. You can do that even right now. You could just take three slow intentional deep breaths to just reset emotionally. Have you ever gotten so upset or wound up that you're like, oh my God, what do I do? Pace, let me go outside for a walk. All of those things are great. But if you just took three slow, intentional, deep breaths, that could help reset your emotions too. So we talked about your physical, we talked about emotional, and I hit on that spiritual rest. That soul rest is so important as well. And that should involve definitely prayer and reading God's word and just being still and intentional with that as well. Hmm. What about mental rest? When I actually rest mentally, I usually fall asleep because I am detaching from anything that's going on around me, and I just like to lie down and be still and take those calming deep breaths and visualize. A mental rest involves visualization, seeing things from a different perspective. It also involves faith. If you are in one place and you desire to be somewhere else, then see that. Visualize actually earning the position that you want, see the house where you want to live, see the vacations you want to take. All of those things are part of your mental rest. And then what about creative rest? That's one of my favorites. Because creative rest, you can do absolutely anything, it doesn't have to make sense to anybody else. And even if it involves movement or doing something, you're like, Ruth, how's that resting? If you're exercising, if you're dancing, I love that about creative rest. It's your choice, it's not according to anyone else, but it involves whatever you choose. That's what's so great about creative rest. That's what creative is it's creative to you, it's whatever you choose to do, and then the ultimate social rest. Have you had any social rest? If you're anything like me and I'm a huge extrovert, everybody knows that I'm a people person. I do, I love people, I truly enjoy other people's company, but sometimes I don't. So I still need social rest. Ask my family. I can go in my room and close the door and not be bothered. I'm not on my phone, I'm not watching television. I may just have uh music playing in the background, but that's the time for me to recharge, for me to get back centered and realizing exactly what it is that I love to do and what I what it is that I desire to do. And then the final one that I think is most important in this day and time is a sensory rest. Yeah, you're watching me right now or listening to me on some type of device, and I appreciate it. Speaking of which, if you have not, please subscribe, like, and share this episode, especially if it's blessing you. But a form of sensory rest, I really encourage you, beautiful, to take that. Some type of shutting down digitally, virtually, and just unplugging. We all need to do it. You need to unplug your device sometimes. You know how sometimes your phone or your computer is not running correctly because it's been on all the time. All of your notifications going off and just keep binging, binging you, and just causing you to jump every time you hear something. Ooh, who is that? Ooh, did somebody like something I posted? Did somebody say they needed me? Just decompress and shut down, walk away. Have you ever left your phone at home accidentally before? Did you go back and get it because you felt as if you had missed something or there will be an emergency and you needed to respond to it even though you're not an emergency 911 dispatcher? Yeah, it happens. But let me tell you, the times that I have left my phone at home, there it's been just a few. And sometimes I've gone back because I actually needed it where I was going. But the times that I left my phone and I said, you know what, girl, leave it. Leave it at home. Whatever they need, they'll figure it out. No one is going to miss me. And I was pleasantly surprised when I got home and got back to my phone and I had not missed a phone call or a text. And I realized I had unplugged, it wasn't intentional, but it felt so very good. So just to recap, I want you to think about when was the last time that you actually properly rested in all of these areas? Your emotional rest, your mental rest, your physical rest, your creative rest, your social rest, your sensory rest, and your spiritual rest. When was the last time, friend? Well, it's not too late. Why don't you just schedule some rest time today, tomorrow, but definitely very soon, let your family know I'm not available right now. I'm gonna take some moment that's some time to rest for me. And then after you do it and let me know how you feel, schedule it sometime again, do it again, and then again, put it on your calendar, and I guarantee you it will bless your life. So, guess what? I decided to do in addition to those areas that I shared with you. I said, as much as I love my family and I love my home, sometimes I just need to get away to rest. Like, because when we're home, ladies, if you're once again anything like me, who let me throw a load of laundry in. I'm supposed to be resting, but let me clean the kitchen right quickly, or let me clean this, let me straighten off my desk, all those things. It's something that always needs to be done. So I decided to once a month just go find a very inexpensive hotel room and spend the night there, treat myself to a nice dinner, go to a hotel and just lie there and just be. And sometimes I have planned my week, I've planned my month, but it's such an amazing reset and a time of rest. So if you can do something like that, even if it is your birthday or you could just do it for any type of celebration, I urge you to do it sooner than later. Please do, please do because you deserve it. Not only do you deserve it, but God is calling you to it. It's so very important. So, another part of my rest is when I get the opportunity to plan uh episodes and shows like this to bless you and to share information with you that I have learned to do. That's what this journey is all about. You're in this with me, and I am partner with partnering with you so that we can embrace peace together. This type of rest, these types of rest, is all to help you have a moment, just a moment where you can deep breathe and you can take in exactly where you are and just embrace the present because that's what peace is. The peace of God is embracing every moment and enjoying every present moment and being present. So let me tell you another way that I rest. When I travel, if I'm going to an event, especially some type of conference or a retreat or something, I tend to go in early or stay later, or a little bit of both, because I want to be well rested going into the conference, and I definitely want to be rested when I return home. A lot of people, you know, jump on a flight and come right home and jump right back into their daily routines, which is fine, but when it is possible for you, please do as I uh just shared with you and just enjoy some rest on the front or the back end. So let me show you a little bit of how I rest when I travel. See what I mean? Like, so very important. I came home refreshed and able to love on my family and to just share with them how important it is, and of course, I am modeling that for my children and for future generations that I teach how important rest is. So, once again, if you have the opportunity, just try it. Rest either on the front or on the back end of your travels, and I'm pretty sure that you'll keep doing it. So, if you enjoyed this episode, please, please, please, like I said before, subscribe, like, and share. And let me know which form of rest is most important for you to start taking, like right now, guilt free, because you should not feel guilty about resting. That's the only way that you'll be able to pour into others and definitely have an overabundance. You don't have any overflow if you're not resting. So, my friends, please let me know in which area that you're going to focus, and I am going to hold you to it. Make me your accountability partner so we can talk about this and that we can stay on this journey of peace on in our pursuit of purpose together. Thank you so much again for watching. And until next time, and as always, stay serene.