You didn't need rest.
Let's have some fun this beat is sick.
There was a time where I didn’t leave my house. People who just met me probably thinks I don’t really have a life anymore. My new contacts were surprised that I ask them to hang out in my place so soon. The people I date were sick of me turning my bed into restaurants, entertainment center, my own little city that I actually want to sleep in. People who do know me are well aware that I’ve been canceling plans on purpose. I sleep in (way too early) these days, I drink water when I wake up and put on lip gloss before bed. I've taken up a residency in my own Silent Hill, lying down in my bed dramatically for the name of self care.
But more often than not, there were days where I wake up after a full night of rest feeling mysteriously still tired. It’s as if I’ve shut myself down that night, but something’s not resetting itself. It took me some time that what I was missing wasn’t stillness, but something that made me feel briefly and irresponsibly alive. Simply put, I didn’t need more sleep. I needed more fun.
Resting has been treated like a moral achievement. Exhaustion is almost a credential, and recovery is treated like a disciplined practice you need to perform correctly in order to deserve your flowers. If you say you’re overwhelmed, someone will suggest a break. If you say you’re stressed, someone will tell you to log off and detach. While these suggestions aren’t necessarily wrong, sometimes I think they didn’t land every time. It’s like being handed a blanket, when what you really want is to be grabbed gently by the shoulders, shaken, and be reminded that you are an actual person with desires and a pulse.
I have been sleeping early for months now to notice when rest “doesn’t work” for me anymore. It’s usually because: I’m not actually tired. I’m bored. Uninspired. I replay the same thoughts in my head with better lighting and a soundtrack. Rest can usually quiet the noise, but it doesn’t change the channel. Fun does.
Fun has a branding problem. It sounds unserious. Frivolous. Hedonistic. It’s something you’re supposed to grow out of, or save for vacations and weekends that arrive exhausted (remember that time you need a vacation from your vacation?). Saying I need to rest reads as responsible and mature. Saying I need to go and do something fun sounds reckless. As if joy needs to be justified. But pure, unadulterated fun, that clean high* I’m talking about is not escapism. It’s engagement. It’s a moment where your mind and body agree to be in the same place at the same time.
There are nights where I go to bed when people are usually having dinners, and I would wake up just as tired as the day before. And there has been nights where I come home too late, feet sore, phone wet and sticky from spilled drinks, hungover, and feel somehow steadier the next morning. Fun is almost never about discipline. It’s about being alive. It pulls me out of meditation and back into sensation. It gives me a life outside of my internal monologue.
The last times I’ve felt genuinely restored, I realize they almost never involved being horizontal (unless you’re sunbathing on the beach, sleeping on the rocks of a waterfall, floating on a lake). They involved laughing harder than I meant to, dancing with the same friends, getting shit food right after, or cooking in the kitchen (badly) and almost burning the house, letting myself be unserious in a way that weren’t supposed to teach me anything, or move my life forward for the better. Those nights didn’t fix anything. But it certainly made things feel fixable.
I don’t think I’m meant to optimize myself into contentment. If life is supposed to be dreadful anyway, it’s also meant to be interrupted by pockets of joy. If you’ve been resting and still feels deflated, maybe being still isn’t giving you anything. Maybe what you’re missing isn’t the quiet, but laughter. Not recovery, but revelry. You might not be tired. You might just need to remember what fun looks like, and not explain why.
*By “clean high,” I mean fun that’s energizing without being destructive. Joy that doesn’t involve endangering yourself, inconveniencing your friends, or waking up with regret that’s not funny and can be used against you.