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Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto
Far too many of us have claimed productivity as the cornerstone of success. Brainwashed by capitalism, we subject our bodies and minds to work at an unrealistic, damaging, and machine‑level pace of work –– feeding into the same engine that enslaved millions into brutal labor for its virtuous benefit. Our worth does not reside in how much we produce, especially for a system that exploits and dehumanizes us. Rest, in its simplest form, becomes an act of resistance and a reclaiming of power because it disrupts and pushes back against capitalism and white supremacy.
From the founder and creator of The Nap Ministry, Rest Is Resistance is a battle cry, a guidebook, a map for a movement, and a field guide for the weary and hopeful. It is rooted in spiritual energy and centered in Black liberation, womanism, somatics, and Afrofuturism. With captivating storytelling and practical advice, all delivered in Hersey’s lyrical voice and informed by her deep experience in theology, activism, and performance art, Rest Is Resistance is a call to action and manifesto for those who are sleep deprived, searching for justice, and longing to be liberated from the oppressive grip of Grind Culture.
From the founder and creator of The Nap Ministry, Rest Is Resistance is a battle cry, a guidebook, a map for a movement, and a field guide for the weary and hopeful. It is rooted in spiritual energy and centered in Black liberation, womanism, somatics, and Afrofuturism. With captivating storytelling and practical advice, all delivered in Hersey’s lyrical voice and informed by her deep experience in theology, activism, and performance art, Rest Is Resistance is a call to action and manifesto for those who are sleep deprived, searching for justice, and longing to be liberated from the oppressive grip of Grind Culture.
224 pages, Hardcover
Published October 11, 2022
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August 1, 2022
While I don't tend to be a big believer in 'fate', this book might change my mind. I have been struggling immensely for a while now, trying to find my balance with disability and a lifelong trauma response that tells me I am worthless unless I participate in the grind. I was incredibly fortunate enough to get an ARC via NetGalley to read and review, and wow, this book will leave you in tears in all the right ways.
Rest is Resistance is a book that reminds us that we are worthy of rest, of self care, of prioritizing ourselves - even when society tells us otherwise. Tricia Hersey writes passionately, and intimately, with her viewpoint as a Black woman who has struggled and faced the grind, and decided to prioritize rest even when the world said not to. This book does talk heavily about the effect of capitalism and white supremacy on our Western society, but Tricia makes the very true point that white supremacy doesn't only affect BIPOC people, but it also harms white people. We shouldn't have to make it about ourselves to care, but the truth is that "No one is truly free, until we are ALL FREE", as Tricia quotes. We cannot be free until those who are fighting the hardest fights are able to rest as well.
Growing up in traumatic circumstances often lends a trauma response of constant grinding. If you have grown up not knowing if you'd have a roof over your head (or not having one at all), not knowing what you'll have to eat, and other basic human needs - you grow up feeling the constant need to fight and prove yourself, and protect yourself. You are always 'on', and when you cannot be 'on', there is the constant guilt and fear of failure. With my disabilities pushing harder every day, I have been fighting that battle, and feeling like I wasn't 'enough'. Constantly feeling guilty when I am forced to lay down, or my body will go down without my consent.
This book tells you, over and over again - you ARE worthy. You could do nothing but lay in bed for months on end, and your value would not decrease. As human beings, our value does not rotate around what we can provide to others, what money we can earn, and how many hours we can work a day. But, a capitalist society keeps trying to tell us that. And, it harms so many people. Tricia understands the fear of feeling like if you stop grinding, you'll have nothing. She does not write from a position of privilege, but from one of having lived in the proverbial trenches.
At the core, this book really represents the message of what The Nap Ministry stands for. It feels like a supportive embrace, and a reminder to those of us fighting to love ourselves - that we are worthy. That our broken society does not own our bodies, our mind, our hearts and our focus.
As any transformative book will, this has elements that some people might find uncomfortable. A lot of white people will be uncomfortable with the discussion about white supremacy, a focus on Black liberation and discussing history from enslaved people. But, when a book pushes you into discomfort, it is an opportunity to learn more, and do better. There are also a lot of very valid points about social media and how it ties into capitalism. Technology is vital for many reasons, but we also want to remain in control of it, and not let social media control us.
This is definitely a book I will purchase and read again, when I need a reminder that I am not alone in seeking rest, balance and knowing my worth.
Rest is Resistance is a book that reminds us that we are worthy of rest, of self care, of prioritizing ourselves - even when society tells us otherwise. Tricia Hersey writes passionately, and intimately, with her viewpoint as a Black woman who has struggled and faced the grind, and decided to prioritize rest even when the world said not to. This book does talk heavily about the effect of capitalism and white supremacy on our Western society, but Tricia makes the very true point that white supremacy doesn't only affect BIPOC people, but it also harms white people. We shouldn't have to make it about ourselves to care, but the truth is that "No one is truly free, until we are ALL FREE", as Tricia quotes. We cannot be free until those who are fighting the hardest fights are able to rest as well.
Growing up in traumatic circumstances often lends a trauma response of constant grinding. If you have grown up not knowing if you'd have a roof over your head (or not having one at all), not knowing what you'll have to eat, and other basic human needs - you grow up feeling the constant need to fight and prove yourself, and protect yourself. You are always 'on', and when you cannot be 'on', there is the constant guilt and fear of failure. With my disabilities pushing harder every day, I have been fighting that battle, and feeling like I wasn't 'enough'. Constantly feeling guilty when I am forced to lay down, or my body will go down without my consent.
This book tells you, over and over again - you ARE worthy. You could do nothing but lay in bed for months on end, and your value would not decrease. As human beings, our value does not rotate around what we can provide to others, what money we can earn, and how many hours we can work a day. But, a capitalist society keeps trying to tell us that. And, it harms so many people. Tricia understands the fear of feeling like if you stop grinding, you'll have nothing. She does not write from a position of privilege, but from one of having lived in the proverbial trenches.
At the core, this book really represents the message of what The Nap Ministry stands for. It feels like a supportive embrace, and a reminder to those of us fighting to love ourselves - that we are worthy. That our broken society does not own our bodies, our mind, our hearts and our focus.
As any transformative book will, this has elements that some people might find uncomfortable. A lot of white people will be uncomfortable with the discussion about white supremacy, a focus on Black liberation and discussing history from enslaved people. But, when a book pushes you into discomfort, it is an opportunity to learn more, and do better. There are also a lot of very valid points about social media and how it ties into capitalism. Technology is vital for many reasons, but we also want to remain in control of it, and not let social media control us.
This is definitely a book I will purchase and read again, when I need a reminder that I am not alone in seeking rest, balance and knowing my worth.
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November 16, 2022Ok I had some time to think about this book. I think overall the issue I had is the book read as disjointed thoughts with moments of poignant thoughts. The central argument was rest is a form resistance and a tenant of liberation. Great, I'm on board but the points the author made to support this argument were either not fully developed or repetitive.
So I'm struggling with this review because quotes like these were so on point but it was mixed in with felt like a stream of consciousness-
• Rest is a form of resistance because it disrupts and pushes back against capitalism and white supremacy.
• Grind culture has made us all human machines, willing and ready to donate our lives to a capitalist system that thrives by placing profits over people. The Rest Is Resistance movement is a connection and a path back to our true nature.
• The “success” grind culture props up centers constant labor, material wealth, and overworking as a badge of honor. Resting is about the beginning process of undoing trauma so that we can thrive and evolve back to our natural state: a state of ease and rest.
Do I think this book is necessary? Absolutely!
Do I think I we need to have more holistic conversations about rest, particularly through the lens of a counterargument to capitalism? Yes!
I just think the writing was not up to par, though I would feel comfortable still recommending it. Though, I hope the finished copy addressed my writing concerns.
Thank you to the publisher for providing an arc in exchange for an honest review.
CN: poverty, medical trauma, sexism, racism, burnout
So I'm struggling with this review because quotes like these were so on point but it was mixed in with felt like a stream of consciousness-
• Rest is a form of resistance because it disrupts and pushes back against capitalism and white supremacy.
• Grind culture has made us all human machines, willing and ready to donate our lives to a capitalist system that thrives by placing profits over people. The Rest Is Resistance movement is a connection and a path back to our true nature.
• The “success” grind culture props up centers constant labor, material wealth, and overworking as a badge of honor. Resting is about the beginning process of undoing trauma so that we can thrive and evolve back to our natural state: a state of ease and rest.
Do I think this book is necessary? Absolutely!
Do I think I we need to have more holistic conversations about rest, particularly through the lens of a counterargument to capitalism? Yes!
I just think the writing was not up to par, though I would feel comfortable still recommending it. Though, I hope the finished copy addressed my writing concerns.
Thank you to the publisher for providing an arc in exchange for an honest review.
CN: poverty, medical trauma, sexism, racism, burnout
December 23, 2022
My introduction to Tricia Hersey is Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto. Published in 2022, this came to my attention via Carmen with her excellent recent review. I'd been watching YouTube videos in which women chronicle their experiences living in their cars and without referring to Hersey or the Nap Ministry, one of the Black "car lifers" presented Hersey's thesis: rest is a form of resistance against the machine-level pace of our culture and a key to surviving poverty, exhaustion, white supremacy and capitalism with our body and mind intact.
-- When I started resting to save my life and connect with my Ancestors, I was a poor, Black, queer woman in graduate school on student loans with thousands of dollars in debt. I had been unemployed and underemployed since I was a full-time student worker in an archive library on campus barely making $12 an hour for a few hours weekly. I was also working for free as part of an internship for my studies while taking a full load of classes and caring for a six-year-old child. I am and was a first-generation adult graduate student with a child and a husband who was working fifty-plus hours a week to pay our rent while I studied. Once I finished my program, I couldn't find work in my field even after going on countless interviews. I remember sitting on my side of my bed crying because I had negative $25 in my bank account, no car and no savings. This is not a movement created by a person speaking about rest from some sort of position of privilege outside of being traumatized from capitalism and white supremacy. I'm telling you it's possible because I am the poster child and witness. Rest saved my life.
-- I watched my father get up every morning at four a.m. He would drag himself out of bed to sit at the kitchen table to read three newspapers, study his Bible and pray silently. He would do this for almost two hours before he needed to leave for work at six. I remember asking, "Why do you get up so early when you don't have to be at work until later?" He replied, "I want to have a few moments in the day that belong to just me before I clock in."
-- Resting can look like:
1. Closing your eyes for ten minutes.
2. A longer shower in silence.
3. Meditating on the couch for twenty minutes.
4. Daydreaming by staring out of a window.
5. Sipping warm tea before bed in the dark.
6. Slow dancing with yourself to slow music.
7. Experiencing a Sound Bath or other sound healing.
8. A Sun Salutation.
9. A twenty-minute timed nap.
10. Praying.
11. Crafting a small altar for your home.
12. A long, warm bath.
13. Taking regular breaks from social media.
14. Not immediately responding to texts and emails.
15. Deep listening to a full music album.
16. A meditative walk in nature.
17. Knitting, crocheting, sewing, and quilting.
18. Playing a musical instrument.
19. Deep eye contact.
20. Laughing intensely.
-- The concept of filling up your cup first, so you can have enough in it to pour to others feel off balance. It reeks of capitalist language that is now a part of our daily mantras. Language like "I will sleep when I am dead," "Rise and grind," "While they sleep, I grind," "If it doesn't make money, it doesn't make sense," "Wake up and hustle," and many more. The cup metaphor also is most often geared toward women, who, because of patriarchy and sexism, carry the burden of labor. Marginalized women, specifically Black and Latina women, make up the largest group of laborers in a capitalist system. Our labor history historically has been used to make the lives of white women less hectic and more relaxed. So when I hear and see this "filling your cup" language repeated on memes on social media and in the larger wellness community, I realize that our view of rest is still burdened with the lies of grind culture. I propose that the cups all be broken into little pieces, and we replace pouring with resting and connecting with our bodies in a way that is centered on experimentation and repair. I don't want to pour anymore.
One of Hersey's contributions is being an advocate for rest. Everywhere we turn, there are apostles for productivity: growing faster, advancing further, earning more, boosting your numbers. Slowing down, taking a breather, or daydreaming are practically heretical. The very thought of quitting seems hateful to most westerners. It makes me wonder who's benefiting from these narratives. Not people who are content with what they have. I was relieved to find reinforcement here that I'm already doing a few things on Hersey's list: taking long showers, a half hour nap after lunch on workdays and taking a walk when I get home.
Hersey includes a few personal anecdotes and I would've liked much more of that. Most of this manifesto is repetitive, with words like "grind culture," "side hustle," "white supremacy" or "capitalism" repeated over and over and over. I would've preferred a book that included interviews with social scientists, teachers, caregivers and others discussing how they burned out, how they benefited from rest and what that looked like for them. This manifesto is a good starting point, but my recommendation is to put your $13 toward rest and instead of buying this ebook, search Tricia Hersey on Google or YouTube.
-- When I started resting to save my life and connect with my Ancestors, I was a poor, Black, queer woman in graduate school on student loans with thousands of dollars in debt. I had been unemployed and underemployed since I was a full-time student worker in an archive library on campus barely making $12 an hour for a few hours weekly. I was also working for free as part of an internship for my studies while taking a full load of classes and caring for a six-year-old child. I am and was a first-generation adult graduate student with a child and a husband who was working fifty-plus hours a week to pay our rent while I studied. Once I finished my program, I couldn't find work in my field even after going on countless interviews. I remember sitting on my side of my bed crying because I had negative $25 in my bank account, no car and no savings. This is not a movement created by a person speaking about rest from some sort of position of privilege outside of being traumatized from capitalism and white supremacy. I'm telling you it's possible because I am the poster child and witness. Rest saved my life.
-- I watched my father get up every morning at four a.m. He would drag himself out of bed to sit at the kitchen table to read three newspapers, study his Bible and pray silently. He would do this for almost two hours before he needed to leave for work at six. I remember asking, "Why do you get up so early when you don't have to be at work until later?" He replied, "I want to have a few moments in the day that belong to just me before I clock in."
-- Resting can look like:
1. Closing your eyes for ten minutes.
2. A longer shower in silence.
3. Meditating on the couch for twenty minutes.
4. Daydreaming by staring out of a window.
5. Sipping warm tea before bed in the dark.
6. Slow dancing with yourself to slow music.
7. Experiencing a Sound Bath or other sound healing.
8. A Sun Salutation.
9. A twenty-minute timed nap.
10. Praying.
11. Crafting a small altar for your home.
12. A long, warm bath.
13. Taking regular breaks from social media.
14. Not immediately responding to texts and emails.
15. Deep listening to a full music album.
16. A meditative walk in nature.
17. Knitting, crocheting, sewing, and quilting.
18. Playing a musical instrument.
19. Deep eye contact.
20. Laughing intensely.
-- The concept of filling up your cup first, so you can have enough in it to pour to others feel off balance. It reeks of capitalist language that is now a part of our daily mantras. Language like "I will sleep when I am dead," "Rise and grind," "While they sleep, I grind," "If it doesn't make money, it doesn't make sense," "Wake up and hustle," and many more. The cup metaphor also is most often geared toward women, who, because of patriarchy and sexism, carry the burden of labor. Marginalized women, specifically Black and Latina women, make up the largest group of laborers in a capitalist system. Our labor history historically has been used to make the lives of white women less hectic and more relaxed. So when I hear and see this "filling your cup" language repeated on memes on social media and in the larger wellness community, I realize that our view of rest is still burdened with the lies of grind culture. I propose that the cups all be broken into little pieces, and we replace pouring with resting and connecting with our bodies in a way that is centered on experimentation and repair. I don't want to pour anymore.
One of Hersey's contributions is being an advocate for rest. Everywhere we turn, there are apostles for productivity: growing faster, advancing further, earning more, boosting your numbers. Slowing down, taking a breather, or daydreaming are practically heretical. The very thought of quitting seems hateful to most westerners. It makes me wonder who's benefiting from these narratives. Not people who are content with what they have. I was relieved to find reinforcement here that I'm already doing a few things on Hersey's list: taking long showers, a half hour nap after lunch on workdays and taking a walk when I get home.
Hersey includes a few personal anecdotes and I would've liked much more of that. Most of this manifesto is repetitive, with words like "grind culture," "side hustle," "white supremacy" or "capitalism" repeated over and over and over. I would've preferred a book that included interviews with social scientists, teachers, caregivers and others discussing how they burned out, how they benefited from rest and what that looked like for them. This manifesto is a good starting point, but my recommendation is to put your $13 toward rest and instead of buying this ebook, search Tricia Hersey on Google or YouTube.
November 5, 2022
I’m fully bought into the “Rest is Resistance” movement and I think this book,and Tricia’s work in general, is important.
I did not love this book though. I did not enjoy the structure, the editing, or the writing style.
There was a lot of repetition (coulda been a blogpost if you ask me), and ironically concepts were not well defined/ introduced or unpacked. Pages were saturated with “white supremacy”, “capitalism” and other social justice and political buzzwords. Like I get it. I’m just as woke as the next Black woman.
I LOVED the personal stories sprinkled around the book. Honestly this might have read better as a memoir than a manifesto because the manifesto was not manifesto-ing for me.
To be fair to Tricia, I’m also reading Angela Davis in parallel and she is one hell of a rigorous writer. So maybe my critique is a bit harsh.
Would I recommend this book, yes. You can probably skim through it in a day. Would I read it again, probably not.
I did not love this book though. I did not enjoy the structure, the editing, or the writing style.
There was a lot of repetition (coulda been a blogpost if you ask me), and ironically concepts were not well defined/ introduced or unpacked. Pages were saturated with “white supremacy”, “capitalism” and other social justice and political buzzwords. Like I get it. I’m just as woke as the next Black woman.
I LOVED the personal stories sprinkled around the book. Honestly this might have read better as a memoir than a manifesto because the manifesto was not manifesto-ing for me.
To be fair to Tricia, I’m also reading Angela Davis in parallel and she is one hell of a rigorous writer. So maybe my critique is a bit harsh.
Would I recommend this book, yes. You can probably skim through it in a day. Would I read it again, probably not.
March 26, 2023
Update: I have already purchased two copies for dear ones ✨
Holy verses with an emphases on selah🖤 A vital book for anyone on their healing journey or anyone who hasn’t started theirs yet (everyone!).
Thank you so much to The Nap Bishop-Tricia Hersey, Little, Brown and Company Publishers, and NetGalley for this ARC!
Holy verses with an emphases on selah🖤 A vital book for anyone on their healing journey or anyone who hasn’t started theirs yet (everyone!).
Thank you so much to The Nap Bishop-Tricia Hersey, Little, Brown and Company Publishers, and NetGalley for this ARC!
December 17, 2022
Oh, I'm so torn about this one, but ultimately, this book is the definition of "could have been an essay." I love so much about the project of this book, which explores how rest is an act of resistance against the forces of capitalism and White supremacy. I wholeheartedly agree that rest is essential in our resistance movements, and we cannot spearhead true change unless we find the courage and the strength to rest. Rest is our divine right, our human right, not a luxury or a privilege. We must center rest not only as a tool to become more productive but as a way to just simply exist in this world as a whole human being.
All of that is incredible. Hersey drew the connections between Sabbath, White supremacy, and capitalism in a way that needs to be talked about more specifically. She brings in her experience as a Black woman to talk about how the legacy of slavery permeates every aspect of life, including the need for machine-level productivity, and we ALL must resist. Rest is what allows us to dream, to imagine a different world, and then to live into that world.
Unfortunately, this book ended up just being 224 pages of saying those exact words in slightly different phrases. I understand on some level that this repetition was intentional so that we would slow down and focus on the simplicity of her message, but it made it such a boring reading experience for me. I could have read a blog post or listened to her talk about it on a podcast and gotten the same level of insight from it.
I also wish that there had been more data, more historical analysis, more personal anecdotes. The manifesto format does lend itself to those staccato phrases that stick in one's mind, but it can't carry an entire book on its own. I wanted Hersey to go more in detail about the historical context of what she was saying and dig more into the links between slavery, capitalism, and White supremacy. I believed her premise, and she is right, but I wish it had been given more exploration. I also wanted more of her own personal story. She would start talking about her personal story and then she would veer off into saying the same phrases again and again. It made me zone out about halfway through the audiobook.
All of that said, I think that her ministry is so incredibly important, and if you're just beginning to think through these themes, I would highly recommend this book. I am definitely going to be following her in the future and ingest her content and material in a different form. And then I'm going to do exactly what she says to do and REST.
All of that is incredible. Hersey drew the connections between Sabbath, White supremacy, and capitalism in a way that needs to be talked about more specifically. She brings in her experience as a Black woman to talk about how the legacy of slavery permeates every aspect of life, including the need for machine-level productivity, and we ALL must resist. Rest is what allows us to dream, to imagine a different world, and then to live into that world.
Unfortunately, this book ended up just being 224 pages of saying those exact words in slightly different phrases. I understand on some level that this repetition was intentional so that we would slow down and focus on the simplicity of her message, but it made it such a boring reading experience for me. I could have read a blog post or listened to her talk about it on a podcast and gotten the same level of insight from it.
I also wish that there had been more data, more historical analysis, more personal anecdotes. The manifesto format does lend itself to those staccato phrases that stick in one's mind, but it can't carry an entire book on its own. I wanted Hersey to go more in detail about the historical context of what she was saying and dig more into the links between slavery, capitalism, and White supremacy. I believed her premise, and she is right, but I wish it had been given more exploration. I also wanted more of her own personal story. She would start talking about her personal story and then she would veer off into saying the same phrases again and again. It made me zone out about halfway through the audiobook.
All of that said, I think that her ministry is so incredibly important, and if you're just beginning to think through these themes, I would highly recommend this book. I am definitely going to be following her in the future and ingest her content and material in a different form. And then I'm going to do exactly what she says to do and REST.
December 8, 2022
Maybe my most frustrating read this year. How can I go from feeling total validation on one page to feeling total disdain to the next? I’ll try to explain.
For starters, I love the thesis: “Rest is a form of resistance because it disrupts and pushes back against capitalism and white supremacy… Rest is radical because it disrupts the lie that we are not doing enough. I am enough. I am worthy now and always because I am here” (7-8). I can get on board with any worldview that legitimizes the dignity of all people, no matter their productivity or ability, and in addition to capitalism and white supremacy Hersey takes aim at grind culture, social media, and rest as a means for more production. These things should be scrutinized, and I was ready to hear compelling arguments for rest as practice and against a system that sees us only as machines. Unfortunately the book left me wanting.
In general, the whole thing is around 200 very short pages, and yet it is totally disorganized. Hersey repeats herself constantly (I must have read the words “capitalism,” “grind culture,” and “white supremacy” about 50,000 times), makes section titles that don’t match the content underneath them, asks questions that aren’t answered for 100 pages (if at all), splits up stories so that they show up in bits and pieces all over the book, and claims to offer solutions to our production-centered world while also saying she doesn’t have prescriptions or step-by-step instructions. It’s hard for me to explain how she came up with her philosophy, how she practices, or how rest will give us true liberation because of this disorganization. I get the sense she is a compelling speaker and her words would be effective as a sermon, but as a written text it doesn’t translate and left me sort of lost.
But what’s more problematic than the disorganization is her slew of unsubstantiated claims. As a prime example she writes on social media: “Currently the Metaverse has become real. Millions of people are waiting anxiously for this digital world to materialize so they can move in and stay” (70). Are they? I don’t know a single person who wants to transfer their whole social life to Facebook of all places. She makes other claims. Grind culture has taken over our medical system (21), grind culture is a collaboration between capitalism and white supremacy (38), and shallow wellness work that doesn’t speak about dismantling these systems are making us unwell (133). I understand the use and place for hyperbole, and again, I’m inclined to agree with all of these claims. I just don’t respond well to bold statements and claims that are backed up by a feeling, or in other words, backed up by nothing. This book will not convince anyone who doesn’t already agree with Hersey’s thesis that rest is a necessary form of resistance, and that’s a problem for a book that I assume is intended to be persuasive.
It’s a real bummer, because Hersey has some incredible stories that are compelling! Slave narratives, her father’s story as a railroad worker and community organizer, her personal story as a mother, student, and worker are all used as wonderful examples of how overproduction and grind culture are killing us. She tells a heartbreaking story of a child who is not allowed to use the bathroom at school and ends up wetting himself because our school system is more focused on creating automatons than listening to the needs of its students’ bodies (22-23). Hersey has imaginative ideas on what liberation looks like, she is challenging the idea that pursuing justice is unrealistic, and she really practices what she preaches (She has found a way to take month long work sabbaths in spite of trying to organize and grow a movement).
The book desperately needs an editor because there are nuggets of gold among all the chaotic organization and unsubstantiated claims. It’s hard for me to recommend this but it is very short if you do want to give it a go. If you do, please do take the author’s advice and read it lying down.
For starters, I love the thesis: “Rest is a form of resistance because it disrupts and pushes back against capitalism and white supremacy… Rest is radical because it disrupts the lie that we are not doing enough. I am enough. I am worthy now and always because I am here” (7-8). I can get on board with any worldview that legitimizes the dignity of all people, no matter their productivity or ability, and in addition to capitalism and white supremacy Hersey takes aim at grind culture, social media, and rest as a means for more production. These things should be scrutinized, and I was ready to hear compelling arguments for rest as practice and against a system that sees us only as machines. Unfortunately the book left me wanting.
In general, the whole thing is around 200 very short pages, and yet it is totally disorganized. Hersey repeats herself constantly (I must have read the words “capitalism,” “grind culture,” and “white supremacy” about 50,000 times), makes section titles that don’t match the content underneath them, asks questions that aren’t answered for 100 pages (if at all), splits up stories so that they show up in bits and pieces all over the book, and claims to offer solutions to our production-centered world while also saying she doesn’t have prescriptions or step-by-step instructions. It’s hard for me to explain how she came up with her philosophy, how she practices, or how rest will give us true liberation because of this disorganization. I get the sense she is a compelling speaker and her words would be effective as a sermon, but as a written text it doesn’t translate and left me sort of lost.
But what’s more problematic than the disorganization is her slew of unsubstantiated claims. As a prime example she writes on social media: “Currently the Metaverse has become real. Millions of people are waiting anxiously for this digital world to materialize so they can move in and stay” (70). Are they? I don’t know a single person who wants to transfer their whole social life to Facebook of all places. She makes other claims. Grind culture has taken over our medical system (21), grind culture is a collaboration between capitalism and white supremacy (38), and shallow wellness work that doesn’t speak about dismantling these systems are making us unwell (133). I understand the use and place for hyperbole, and again, I’m inclined to agree with all of these claims. I just don’t respond well to bold statements and claims that are backed up by a feeling, or in other words, backed up by nothing. This book will not convince anyone who doesn’t already agree with Hersey’s thesis that rest is a necessary form of resistance, and that’s a problem for a book that I assume is intended to be persuasive.
It’s a real bummer, because Hersey has some incredible stories that are compelling! Slave narratives, her father’s story as a railroad worker and community organizer, her personal story as a mother, student, and worker are all used as wonderful examples of how overproduction and grind culture are killing us. She tells a heartbreaking story of a child who is not allowed to use the bathroom at school and ends up wetting himself because our school system is more focused on creating automatons than listening to the needs of its students’ bodies (22-23). Hersey has imaginative ideas on what liberation looks like, she is challenging the idea that pursuing justice is unrealistic, and she really practices what she preaches (She has found a way to take month long work sabbaths in spite of trying to organize and grow a movement).
The book desperately needs an editor because there are nuggets of gold among all the chaotic organization and unsubstantiated claims. It’s hard for me to recommend this but it is very short if you do want to give it a go. If you do, please do take the author’s advice and read it lying down.
December 12, 2022
We see care as unnecessary and unimportant. We believe we don't really have to rest. We falsely believe hard work guarantees success in a capitalist system. I have been told this constantly for as long as I can remember. On nights when I worked two jobs, still unable to pay my bills on time or save, I continued to tell myself, "Burn the midnight oil, keep working hard, go to college, find a third job and a side hustle." pg. 24
A 195-page book that could have been an article.
I like the points Hersey makes here. I think she's onto something. I also think her ideas are powerful.
Her radical message is that instead of thinking her Black ancestors wanted a seat at the oppressors' table, instead they probably really wanted a nap.
She argues that 'grind culture' is a result of slavery, plantations, capitalistic devaluing of human life. She says that the most powerful, antiestablishment thing we can do (as humans, this book isn't just aimed at Black readers, she makes that explicit) is refuse to work ourselves to the bone, and instead rest.
She often gets strong pushback for this, having people say to her that they have no time to rest; if they are not constantly being productive every single second of the day, they won't be able to pay bills and will end up in extreme poverty.
As someone who has been impoverished herself, Hersey disagrees with this. She basically feels like resting and making sure you are not exhausted and burnt out is giving the middle finger to white supremacy, capitalism, and our toxic culture. She says even taking a ten-minute nap a day or staring out the window and daydreaming while on the train can be an act of resistance.
She discusses a lot of interesting things in here. She has a virulent hatred of capitalism. She argues that no matter how hard you work, it is damaging yourself instead of making you rich or happy like society tells you it will.
Hustling and grinding trying to get to the unreachable finish line of wealth that most have never enjoyed. The nightmare of capitalism has always been out of reach; we exist only as a product of it. pg. 153
She argues that humans are trained from childhood to become cogs in the corporate machine, to push themselves to ignore their bodies in order to better obey their corporate masters. As children, this starts with things like being punished for daydreaming, being called lazy for not wanting to catch a bus at 7 a.m., or being ordered to hold their bladders until the teacher allows a bathroom break.
Later, my son left the comfort of our slow-paced home into the public school system, and I began to watch slowly how his voice, connection to his body, and intuition were attacked. In elementary school, students are being trained to be workers who can follow orders, memorize facts, and be on time no matter what. Imagination and critical thinking skills are replaced with cookie-cutter learning and standardized testing. I would volunteer in my son's third grade classroom weekly and noticed the young children being told, "Hold your pee. Bathroom break isn't for another twenty minutes." I watched in horror as an eight-year-old squirmed, attempting to wait the twenty minutes until he could allow his body to relieve itself. The teacher, obviously overwhelmed with a large classroom, continued to ignore his cues and he eventually used the bathroom on himself. pg. 22
She argues that this is to turn us into good little workers in the future, in which people refuse to take the paid vacation offered to them, work outside of their work hours, live and die for the company.
"Grind culture has normalized pushing our bodies to the brink of destruction. We proudly proclaim showing up to work or an event despite an injury, sickness, or mental break. We are praised and rewarded for ignoring our body's need for rest, care, and repair. The cycle of grinding like a machine continues and becomes internalized as the only way." pg. 32
I would agree with this basic premise. I would agree with a lot of her basic premises.
This culture does not want you rested unless it is attached to your increased labor and productivity. pg. 94
She is also very against social media, warning readers to remember it does not exist to help you, but in order to help corporations turn profit. For this reason, she takes Sabbaths from social media, sometimes for as long as three months at a time.
...
There are some things I will say as a criticism about Hersey's writing, however.
As I said earlier, this could have been cut down. She calls it a 'manifesto' and it is indeed a manifesto. It goes on and on, repeats over and over and over. She never says something once, she says it fifty times. It's much in the style of a Pentecostal preacher or something along those lines, which I am sure is intentional. Yet even if it is intentional, it's not going to be for every reader. The message is for every reader, I am convinced. I do believe she has powerful and important ideas. But the writing style is long-winded and repetitive. If that annoys you, you might want to skip this or simply read her first section without continuing on to the other ones.
Another thing that didn't gel with me was how woo-woo and spiritual this book is. That's okay, it speaks to Hersey's truth and how she feels, but if you are someone who side-eyes religion, The Spirit, stuff like Divine Humanity and etc. etc. this is going to rub you the wrong way. It's not OVERLY religious or spiritual, but enough that it's going to grate on a lot of readers. She makes everything... spiritualist.
I'd also appreciate a little more insight into her life. She gives us two or three examples of 'Rest as Resistance' in her own life, and when she does, it's fascinating. But I don't know much about her or her life story, I'd have liked a little more discussion of this. I really have no idea who she is or where she's coming from or what makes her tick as a person beyond this 'rest' activism.
She's a poet, perhaps this explains the strange set-up of this book.
TL;DR
I honestly think Hersey is onto something. She raises some great points. She makes some salient arguments. I tend to agree with her on a lot of things. I would recommend this book and think it's an interesting viewpoint and that the book makes you think.
However, it is long-winded and repetitive. It's also wrapped up in a pretty specific and individual spiritualism that might not resonate with all readers. Hersey also doesn't really delve into her own life and her own life experiences. She's got incredible power when she links her outrage and fuck-you attitude towards society with what she's experienced in her own life. But she only offers small glimpses of this in the book.
Worth a read. Worth your time, if only because her ideas are pretty radical. I know so many people who are on the grind. It's sad; entire lives are wasted in pursuit of money. People get married and have children but spend their time and work and don't even know their spouse/children very well. I can't argue with her about the sickness that pervades our culture. And I know plenty of people working two and three jobs. It's quite horrifying, and I agree with Hersey that the choice between working yourself to death or being put out on the street is an inhumane false choice created by capitalist society.
Worth reading for the brain food. Any complaints I have pale in comparison to the big picture.
NAMES IN THIS BOOK:
A 195-page book that could have been an article.
I like the points Hersey makes here. I think she's onto something. I also think her ideas are powerful.
Her radical message is that instead of thinking her Black ancestors wanted a seat at the oppressors' table, instead they probably really wanted a nap.
She argues that 'grind culture' is a result of slavery, plantations, capitalistic devaluing of human life. She says that the most powerful, antiestablishment thing we can do (as humans, this book isn't just aimed at Black readers, she makes that explicit) is refuse to work ourselves to the bone, and instead rest.
She often gets strong pushback for this, having people say to her that they have no time to rest; if they are not constantly being productive every single second of the day, they won't be able to pay bills and will end up in extreme poverty.
As someone who has been impoverished herself, Hersey disagrees with this. She basically feels like resting and making sure you are not exhausted and burnt out is giving the middle finger to white supremacy, capitalism, and our toxic culture. She says even taking a ten-minute nap a day or staring out the window and daydreaming while on the train can be an act of resistance.
She discusses a lot of interesting things in here. She has a virulent hatred of capitalism. She argues that no matter how hard you work, it is damaging yourself instead of making you rich or happy like society tells you it will.
Hustling and grinding trying to get to the unreachable finish line of wealth that most have never enjoyed. The nightmare of capitalism has always been out of reach; we exist only as a product of it. pg. 153
She argues that humans are trained from childhood to become cogs in the corporate machine, to push themselves to ignore their bodies in order to better obey their corporate masters. As children, this starts with things like being punished for daydreaming, being called lazy for not wanting to catch a bus at 7 a.m., or being ordered to hold their bladders until the teacher allows a bathroom break.
Later, my son left the comfort of our slow-paced home into the public school system, and I began to watch slowly how his voice, connection to his body, and intuition were attacked. In elementary school, students are being trained to be workers who can follow orders, memorize facts, and be on time no matter what. Imagination and critical thinking skills are replaced with cookie-cutter learning and standardized testing. I would volunteer in my son's third grade classroom weekly and noticed the young children being told, "Hold your pee. Bathroom break isn't for another twenty minutes." I watched in horror as an eight-year-old squirmed, attempting to wait the twenty minutes until he could allow his body to relieve itself. The teacher, obviously overwhelmed with a large classroom, continued to ignore his cues and he eventually used the bathroom on himself. pg. 22
She argues that this is to turn us into good little workers in the future, in which people refuse to take the paid vacation offered to them, work outside of their work hours, live and die for the company.
"Grind culture has normalized pushing our bodies to the brink of destruction. We proudly proclaim showing up to work or an event despite an injury, sickness, or mental break. We are praised and rewarded for ignoring our body's need for rest, care, and repair. The cycle of grinding like a machine continues and becomes internalized as the only way." pg. 32
I would agree with this basic premise. I would agree with a lot of her basic premises.
This culture does not want you rested unless it is attached to your increased labor and productivity. pg. 94
She is also very against social media, warning readers to remember it does not exist to help you, but in order to help corporations turn profit. For this reason, she takes Sabbaths from social media, sometimes for as long as three months at a time.
...
There are some things I will say as a criticism about Hersey's writing, however.
As I said earlier, this could have been cut down. She calls it a 'manifesto' and it is indeed a manifesto. It goes on and on, repeats over and over and over. She never says something once, she says it fifty times. It's much in the style of a Pentecostal preacher or something along those lines, which I am sure is intentional. Yet even if it is intentional, it's not going to be for every reader. The message is for every reader, I am convinced. I do believe she has powerful and important ideas. But the writing style is long-winded and repetitive. If that annoys you, you might want to skip this or simply read her first section without continuing on to the other ones.
Another thing that didn't gel with me was how woo-woo and spiritual this book is. That's okay, it speaks to Hersey's truth and how she feels, but if you are someone who side-eyes religion, The Spirit, stuff like Divine Humanity and etc. etc. this is going to rub you the wrong way. It's not OVERLY religious or spiritual, but enough that it's going to grate on a lot of readers. She makes everything... spiritualist.
I'd also appreciate a little more insight into her life. She gives us two or three examples of 'Rest as Resistance' in her own life, and when she does, it's fascinating. But I don't know much about her or her life story, I'd have liked a little more discussion of this. I really have no idea who she is or where she's coming from or what makes her tick as a person beyond this 'rest' activism.
She's a poet, perhaps this explains the strange set-up of this book.
TL;DR
I honestly think Hersey is onto something. She raises some great points. She makes some salient arguments. I tend to agree with her on a lot of things. I would recommend this book and think it's an interesting viewpoint and that the book makes you think.
However, it is long-winded and repetitive. It's also wrapped up in a pretty specific and individual spiritualism that might not resonate with all readers. Hersey also doesn't really delve into her own life and her own life experiences. She's got incredible power when she links her outrage and fuck-you attitude towards society with what she's experienced in her own life. But she only offers small glimpses of this in the book.
Worth a read. Worth your time, if only because her ideas are pretty radical. I know so many people who are on the grind. It's sad; entire lives are wasted in pursuit of money. People get married and have children but spend their time and work and don't even know their spouse/children very well. I can't argue with her about the sickness that pervades our culture. And I know plenty of people working two and three jobs. It's quite horrifying, and I agree with Hersey that the choice between working yourself to death or being put out on the street is an inhumane false choice created by capitalist society.
Worth reading for the brain food. Any complaints I have pale in comparison to the big picture.
NAMES IN THIS BOOK:
October 18, 2023
I followed Hersey on Twitter for years & when I left that app - I picked right up following her on FB. I couldn’t be more sad about how much I believe in her message but how disappointed I am in this book.
This desperately needs an editor. It is so repetitive and disorganized. This reads like she took a year’s worth of social media posts and just placed them, in posting order, into a book. I might have been tempted to give it more stars if the price wasn’t a whopping $27 in paperback (ebook is also a hefty $14). Just over 200 pages that could have been cohesively presented in half that. Ironically, it’s a sign of the capitalism she fervently (and rightfully) rages against.
There are so many gems in here that are drowned out by the beating refrain of the words rest, grind culture, capitalism, and white supremacy.
Word counts:
rest = 814
resistance/resist = 223
grind/grind culture = 159
capitalism/capitalist = 148
white supremacy = 63
divine/divinity = 67
Some reviews commented that repetition is necessary so that people can truly understand the pervasiveness of these harmful constructs and form better habits. That would be great if this book was designed as a guidebook or laid out in such a way where readers were invited to slowly and consistently incorporate study, rest, meditation, connection, journaling, etc into their lives. That’s not what this is.
Look, I’m in full agreement with 99% of her assertions. But she doesn’t provide an ounce of (readily available) data to back them up.
Ok. So maybe it’s purely a manifesto. Not intended to prove anything to the reader - but a call to action. What action? Beyond “take a nap”. Yes, there is a small section that contains a very vague list of potential actions like: take a break from social media, build a comfy napping spot, and journal. None of this is ground breaking or presented in a unique way.
The best parts of this book are the stories she shares about herself and her family and their experiences with exhaustion or rest. There’s just not enough of them and the conclusions she sometimes draws are bizarre. Her father dies from having 2 full time jobs plus a ministry. His parishioners literally called on him day & night. Yet her conclusion is that she felt the divine in the crowd that gathered to mourn him. Where was the divine when this man was literally killing himself for their benefit? She shares another story of volunteering at her son’s school and how the system doesn’t let children go to the bathroom and kids are peeing on themselves because they aren’t physically capable of holding it. Yet she offers no insight into if or what she’s done to change the school’s policies.
Hersey talks about writing meditations but only offers a single example. She states in the book that she’s been actively researching and tweaking her meditations for over 10 years. This could have been such an amazing book full of prompts/guides on how to actually do that.
It makes my heart hurt how this opportunity and momentum were wasted.
Narration:
Hersey narrates this herself. Is it professional level, no. However it is enjoyable and her passion definitely shines through.
This desperately needs an editor. It is so repetitive and disorganized. This reads like she took a year’s worth of social media posts and just placed them, in posting order, into a book. I might have been tempted to give it more stars if the price wasn’t a whopping $27 in paperback (ebook is also a hefty $14). Just over 200 pages that could have been cohesively presented in half that. Ironically, it’s a sign of the capitalism she fervently (and rightfully) rages against.
There are so many gems in here that are drowned out by the beating refrain of the words rest, grind culture, capitalism, and white supremacy.
Word counts:
rest = 814
resistance/resist = 223
grind/grind culture = 159
capitalism/capitalist = 148
white supremacy = 63
divine/divinity = 67
Some reviews commented that repetition is necessary so that people can truly understand the pervasiveness of these harmful constructs and form better habits. That would be great if this book was designed as a guidebook or laid out in such a way where readers were invited to slowly and consistently incorporate study, rest, meditation, connection, journaling, etc into their lives. That’s not what this is.
Look, I’m in full agreement with 99% of her assertions. But she doesn’t provide an ounce of (readily available) data to back them up.
Ok. So maybe it’s purely a manifesto. Not intended to prove anything to the reader - but a call to action. What action? Beyond “take a nap”. Yes, there is a small section that contains a very vague list of potential actions like: take a break from social media, build a comfy napping spot, and journal. None of this is ground breaking or presented in a unique way.
The best parts of this book are the stories she shares about herself and her family and their experiences with exhaustion or rest. There’s just not enough of them and the conclusions she sometimes draws are bizarre. Her father dies from having 2 full time jobs plus a ministry. His parishioners literally called on him day & night. Yet her conclusion is that she felt the divine in the crowd that gathered to mourn him. Where was the divine when this man was literally killing himself for their benefit? She shares another story of volunteering at her son’s school and how the system doesn’t let children go to the bathroom and kids are peeing on themselves because they aren’t physically capable of holding it. Yet she offers no insight into if or what she’s done to change the school’s policies.
Hersey talks about writing meditations but only offers a single example. She states in the book that she’s been actively researching and tweaking her meditations for over 10 years. This could have been such an amazing book full of prompts/guides on how to actually do that.
It makes my heart hurt how this opportunity and momentum were wasted.
Narration:
Hersey narrates this herself. Is it professional level, no. However it is enjoyable and her passion definitely shines through.
October 11, 2022
This is was a wonderful reminder that I AM ENOUGH in book form and I loved the poems, womanist and other black scholarship used to support her thesis to REST and get free from grind culture and capitalism. This is one of best self-help books I have ever read because it is someone who looks like me, a black woman telling me her story and also encouraging me that I can make it too. DOWN WITH GRIND CULTURE! REST!
April 1, 2023
If I had a shot for each time I read "capitalism" or "white supremacy" I'd be dead by page 20
March 8, 2023
A lot of folks seem to take issue with the repetition in this book. Personally, I found it necessary. The statements Hersey makes about capitalism, white supremacy, grind culture, and the systemic theft of our collective dreamspace might be easy enough to understand theoretically or intellectually, but bodily? That's a different story—and that's the exact level on which Hersey is trying to get through to the reader. This is a manifesto and a lullaby, and should be read as such. I needed Hersey to say these things a hundred times in a hundred different ways before I actually felt them, and began to see my own body's chronic inability to relax as more than just the product of personal/family history and individual dysfunction.
October 13, 2022
What is rest in a liberatory, healing, anti-colonial, anti-racist context? What does it mean to engage in rest as an interwoven, critical piece of culture and of worldbuilding? What is an ethic of rest beyond simply sleeping more, taking a break, and then getting back to the capitalism at hand? What does it mean to prioritize rest in small moments, in big movements, and in all the layers in between? What is rest as resistance?
These are the kinds of sweeping and visionary, but also immediate and personally embodied questions Nap Ministry founder Tricia Hersey sets out to answer in Rest Is Resistance. I view her work as taking place in conversation with Black liberation, with emergent strategy, with decolonization movements, with anti-capitalism, with womanism, with disability justice, with community care and mutual aid discussions, and with sacred economics. Hersey’s inspirations run the gamut from Octavia Butler to the history of maroons in the US American South, while also drawing deeply on the wisdom of her ancestors and her own experiences.
While the book is certainly about the importance of rest, including sleep, and Hersey sees sleep deprivation as an issue of public health and systemic oppression, it’s also very much about a broader context of unlearning grind culture (aka hustle culture) standards of urgency and productivity. It is about resisting white supremacist and capitalist lies in all forms through the portal of rest, reminding ourselves that we don’t need to strive because we already have everything we need. Hersey is thus one of many reimagining justice movements to prioritize healing and presence, claiming boldly that “[t]ruly practicing rest is a battle and a liberation practice.” “Resistance,” she writes, “is a spiritual practice and a practical map. We learn how to make a way by building as we go.”
Writing on grind culture, Hersey reminds us that “[t]his toxic space has been accepted as the norm. It is not normal” and by contrast “[r]est disrupts and makes space for invention, imagination, and restoration.” I appreciate both the realism and the commitment in this stance: “Capitalism may not fall in our lifetimes, and it is not redeemable, so the work is to begin to reclaim your body and time in ways that seem impossible to imagine. We must imagine. The time to rest and resist is now.”
When I first learned about the Nap Ministry, I loved their ethos but also found myself thinking “this is amazing, important, and not for me.” As a white person, I viewed rest as a privilege I had unearned access to, and thus saw my role as working harder so that others could find space for rest. And as a person with a rare condition called idiopathic hypersomnia, I have a strange relationship with sleeping and with naps: the usual admonitions to lie down more, sleep more, nap freely actually sent my health into a serious spiral over decades of attempting to honor rest!
But I still can’t help but notice how these two things, and also my healing, relate in a way that is absolutely in line with what Hersey shares in this book. While I had access to sleep that absolutely relates to my privilege, and I in fact slept a ton, I also spent more than a decade in total denial about my lack of access to rest. By placing myself on the privileged side of a binary, I didn’t give myself access to a birthright that is an important part of liberation for all people, or allow myself to see how sleeping was not the same as resting.
In my mid-twenties I’d wake up early, spend three hours catching naps on public transportation commuting from the apartment I could afford to my job, spend a 9-10 hour workday stressed and trying to operate like a neurotypical person, shove whatever food I could find in my face at the train station while berating myself for both spending money on food and eating food that didn’t support my body, commute-nap my way home again, and crawl into bed for the 10 hours of sleep I required to be even minimally functional. Hobbies and minimal chores were for the weekend, where I’d mostly be online.
Relationships with other humans? Sorry, no time. Presence, reflection, movement practice? Well I might be annoyed at myself for not being able to “fit it in,” but that’s about it. And yet, I didn’t see that this state was unacceptable, because it’s so common. As Hersey writes: ”When you are exhausted, you lack clarity and the ability to see deeply. Your intuition and imagination are stifled by a culture of overworking and disconnection.”
Even when I was able to cut out the commute, I was still in a constantly mental mode—thinking, planning, annoyed at myself for not following logical pathways. ”In our culture we live in our heads always ready to theorize, analyze, and make sense out of everything. In rest and dreaming, we surrender to the unknown.” In retrospect I can see how I was tied up in specific stories of self, rather than open to possibility, and thus missing the generative power of this unknown. Hersey recognizes where we are, but also holds fierce belief in where we could go. ”We may never get to a fully anticapitalist world, but our imagination is resistance. Imagination is a form of care.”
When I was in this cycle of sleep and burnout-levels of work, I understood that human connection was good for me, but it was also hard to stay engaged. I was always just so damn tired! And as the fatigue got worse over the years, I started even working from my bed. Meanwhile, doctors laughed at my predicament and told me that most people would kill to sleep twelve hours a night!
Because we live in such a sleep-deprived culture, in other words, it was impossible for anyone, including me, to see the possibility that I could be sleeping so much and still deprived of rest. It was a story of “you could have it so much worse.”
Which is both true and… kind of irrelevant?
As Hersey explains, ”We internalize the toxic messages received from the culture and begin to hate ourselves unless we are accomplishing a task. We seek external validation from a violent system void of love.” Oof. Preach!
I was totally a rest advocate throughout this time. “Yes, rest!” And I thought I was doing great at it—napping plenty, lying down whenever I felt like it, not setting an alarm even when I’d sleep twelve, sixteen, and at the worst point twenty hours in a row. But I needed a more nuanced approach like Hersey’s, taking into account body relationship, spirit, and this more holistic understanding of rest as something that is systematically de-prioritized in a capitalist culture.
In the book, Hersey explores rest itself but also looks at dreaming, resistance, imagination through the lens of rest—what does rest make possible? What is the purpose of rest? How can rest help us to come home to ourselves and find what we’re meant for, to set healthy boundaries, to refuse grind culture? “What miraculous moments are you missing because you aren’t resting?”
There are a lot of books out now, and more coming out every month, about resisting capitalism, hustle culture, and the stressors of a life spent online. Hersey’s contribution enters this canon through engagement with ancestral medicine, rest as a creative space, and the specificity of Black experience, with a real Afrofuturist / emergent strategy vibe. Black readers will find encouragement to tap into the power of their ancestral resilience, while simultaneously refusing the outrageous demands we make on the labor of Black folks (and in particular Black women and femmes.)
Hersey’s writing also engages repetition in a way that may frustrate some more linear readers, but to me this style has the healing power of a sermon, appropriate as she offers the book explicitly as a prayer. As the Nap Minister, Hersey also offers the unique lens of having facilitated hundreds of collective napping experiences, bringing rest beyond the individual. Her work is full of calls to action, prompts, and reflections for the curious reader.
I love how Hersey frames rest as natural state that we all deserve and that our bodies know how to come back to, as an empowering place: “Once we know and remember we are divine, we will not participate and allow anything into our hearts and minds that is not loving and caring. We would treat ourselves and each other like the tender and powerful beings that we are.”
When I was sleeping so much, and still not getting much done, I felt guilty for my own ineptitude and inability to figure it out, but now that I’ve experienced the difference in cognitive quality when I have actually restful sleep, it’s no wonder I was struggling! I also can see how my experience of lacking rest was intimately entangled with the stress of my schedule, and the expectations of work and my peers. Hersey explains: ”Grinding keeps us in a cycle of trauma; rest disturbs and disrupts this cycle. Rest is an ethos of reclaiming your body as your own. Rest provides a portal for healing, imagination, and communication with our DreamSpace.” Simply sleeping doesn’t mean accessing this portal.
The funny thing is, despite all my struggles it turns out I need roughly 8-9 hours of sleep a night like the average adult. But I also need to sit or stand or be moving throughout the entire day to avoid falling into restless, non-nourishing sleep that my body doesn’t actually need. My rest needs are highly personal, logically counterintuitive, and I didn’t discover them through medical care.
It was actually my own spiritual, healing, and justice practice that led me to greater body awareness, to a playfulness in exploring and getting curious, to an ability to observe and re-build relationship with my body, and ultimately to a holistic view that enabled me to connect the dots.
I figured out my sleep condition on a trip I’d been terrified of because it would require me to be active, including two 12-hour drives, at a time when I could barely sit up for an hour without feeling an urgent need to collapse. I couldn’t be roused from sleep to save my life, and suffered long and frequent bouts of terrifying sleep paralysis, where I’d know I wanted to wake up but couldn’t physically move. A couple of days before my trip, I asked a partner to wake me at a certain time, trying to get my body clock somehow calibrated for the drive down, and I apparently had an entire conversation where they thought they’d successfully woken me up, but I was actually just sleep talking!
And yet somehow, I not only survived the trip but thrived. I found way more energy than I had in nearly a year, and while I was wiped by the end of each day I was able to wake up relatively easily in the morning. A few lovely synchronicities led me from this surprising empirical evidence to a name for my condition, which I primarily manage through staying upright all the time and never, ever allowing myself to recline or get my body super comfortable during the day.
This would’ve sounded hellish in the past! But it actually allows me access to energy I haven’t had since age 15. For the first time in my entire life I feel rested after just eight hours of sleep. My metabolism also naturally adjusted once I was sleeping less, which led to a whole other array of symptoms doctors had paid more attention to than the oversleep falling away on their own.
Obviously, most people who are tired aren’t going to have the experience I had, and a lot of people experiencing sleep deprivation are also pushing against tremendous burdens I have never had to experience. But at the same time, I think my story is a great example of the possibilities available when we look for space inside of ourselves, institute even a small and simple practice of body awareness, and are willing to get curious about where our mental stories might not be serving.
When I work with clients we often discover inherited or learned narratives that create restrictive boundaries falling somewhere short of “actually required.” Hersey points, for example, to the common objection “I can’t rest because I need to earn a living!” But in response to this claim that rest is unrealistic, Hersey simply offers, “I am grateful to not be realistic and for the legacy of imagination and trickster energy shown to me by my Ancestors.” While acknowledging real challenges, she also encourages play, creativity, and refusal even when it seems impossible.
Personally, I was holding a story of justice and liberation looking like self-sacrifice, as a white person. Through my healing justice journey, I’ve explored the limitations of this narrow story. The fact is that worldbuilding is about small acts at a personal level. One of these acts, even as someone who benefits from privilege, was honoring my own personal version of rest.
Hersey reminds us: “We are grind culture. Grind culture is our everyday behaviors, expectations, and engagements with each other and the world around us.” White folks are a huge part of the ongoing and active construction of grind culture, so we also need to be part of dismantling it.
While my rest didn’t call me to trust my dreams in the way that Hersey suggests, as I still experience incredibly violent dreams and periodically even skip a night’s sleep just to get rest from that terror, reclaiming rest has made it more possible for me to hold what is mine, and only what is mine. It has also allowed me to see the ways in which I’ve denied myself a right to rest—for example, struggling to acknowledge my ADHD and autistic burnout. When Hersey writes about the trauma of kids being indoctrinated into grind culture, and encourages “napping when the entire culture calls you lazy,” I feel the neurodivergent trauma (and neuroemergent possibility) in my bones.
These days I honor rest by allowing for flexibility in schedules, indulging in dance breaks, and refusing to market myself in most of the ways I’ve been told I must do or I will fail. I honor rest by trusting that the “impossible” will happen, and that I will be able to meet my material needs when my current savings run out, even though I can’t see a path to that right now—rather than shifting course and putting down my current spacious rhythms to return to the grind.
Hersey encourages this ambiguity and uncertainty: “We don’t have to have a complete answer to everything right now. We don’t have to know everything. We don’t have to be everything. We don’t have to do everything. There is space for the unknown. There is space for curiosity and mystery. There is space to just allow rest to settle and answer the questions for us.” She beautifully admits, ”I know that my visualizations of what a world without capitalism and oppression look like is based on something I have never experienced in this lifetime. It is dreamwork and alchemy.” This is incredibly resonant with my own experience as an anti-capitalist business owner, experimenting and trusting despite the lack of concrete evidence that I can succeed.
Hersey repeats over and over in this book that she is not donating her body to capitalism, that oppressive systems cannot have her. “I will never donate my body to a system that views it as only a tool for its production. I need you to begin to slowly feel this and to declare that the systems can’t have you. It will take deep work but it’s imaginative and beautiful work that will be a lifelong process.”
Hell, yes. I am committed! Perhaps my business will unfold in a way I can’t currently see. And perhaps, as another possibility, I won’t be able to stay in the spaciousness of my current life, and I’ll need to work for others again, but that doesn’t have to be a death sentence. I’m inspired by Hersey’s question, “Why isn’t our rest powerful enough to be accessed anytime and anywhere?” and open to the possibility that there are ways to rest that I can’t currently imagine.
One of the most beautiful things about Hersey’s viewpoint is how she frames rest as a “meticulous love practice.” She writes, “[t[he amount of connected and intentional rest we can embody becomes a lifeboat on a raging sea. It pours into our capacity to allow for the act of care and love to save us.” I have certainly found that rest allows me to both give and receive more care, and to desire connection in the way that I once craved isolation.
One of the most profound and difficult practices of self-care, in my view, is allowing space for simply being—a space that is generative in a completely different way than “productivity” claims to be. ”Resting is about getting people back to their truest selves. To what they were before capitalism robbed you of your ability to just be.”
When I reclaimed my energy, personally, I was excited about more hours to do things, to build a business from my passions. But even when focused on passion, I had to reckon with the fact that rest is a slow, cyclical never-ending process. The end of my fatigue issues wasn’t a conclusion, but more of a start. I re-committed myself to my new business with gusto on the wings of new energy and ended up going through many cycles of learning around my energy, having to go slower and slower and even slower even though I had physical energy again.
My plans and visions strangely led to very little for quite a while—few connections, growing visibility, or interest in my work, despite how excited I was to share it. In retrospect, though, I can see the blessing of space to learn and confront remaining internalized beliefs. Clearing some of those cobwebs from the closet allowed me to see what came forth from a space of “just being.”
As is likely no surprise, I highly recommend this book as a potential frame to help you see your own path to radical trust in the seemingly impossible and as an ally to affirm your refusal to work in service of systems that are killing you, especially if you’re a Black woman or non-binary person. The style is healing and poetic, and the conversations it will inspire will surely be life changing!
”Resting is not a state of inactivity or a waste of time. Rest is a generative space. When you are resting your body, it is in its most connected state. Your organs are regenerating. Your brain is processing new information. You are connecting with a spiritual practice. You are honoring your body. You are being present. All these things are so foundational for liberation and healing to take root.”
Let’s start planting some seeds together.
[ARC provided through NetGalley.]
These are the kinds of sweeping and visionary, but also immediate and personally embodied questions Nap Ministry founder Tricia Hersey sets out to answer in Rest Is Resistance. I view her work as taking place in conversation with Black liberation, with emergent strategy, with decolonization movements, with anti-capitalism, with womanism, with disability justice, with community care and mutual aid discussions, and with sacred economics. Hersey’s inspirations run the gamut from Octavia Butler to the history of maroons in the US American South, while also drawing deeply on the wisdom of her ancestors and her own experiences.
While the book is certainly about the importance of rest, including sleep, and Hersey sees sleep deprivation as an issue of public health and systemic oppression, it’s also very much about a broader context of unlearning grind culture (aka hustle culture) standards of urgency and productivity. It is about resisting white supremacist and capitalist lies in all forms through the portal of rest, reminding ourselves that we don’t need to strive because we already have everything we need. Hersey is thus one of many reimagining justice movements to prioritize healing and presence, claiming boldly that “[t]ruly practicing rest is a battle and a liberation practice.” “Resistance,” she writes, “is a spiritual practice and a practical map. We learn how to make a way by building as we go.”
Writing on grind culture, Hersey reminds us that “[t]his toxic space has been accepted as the norm. It is not normal” and by contrast “[r]est disrupts and makes space for invention, imagination, and restoration.” I appreciate both the realism and the commitment in this stance: “Capitalism may not fall in our lifetimes, and it is not redeemable, so the work is to begin to reclaim your body and time in ways that seem impossible to imagine. We must imagine. The time to rest and resist is now.”
When I first learned about the Nap Ministry, I loved their ethos but also found myself thinking “this is amazing, important, and not for me.” As a white person, I viewed rest as a privilege I had unearned access to, and thus saw my role as working harder so that others could find space for rest. And as a person with a rare condition called idiopathic hypersomnia, I have a strange relationship with sleeping and with naps: the usual admonitions to lie down more, sleep more, nap freely actually sent my health into a serious spiral over decades of attempting to honor rest!
But I still can’t help but notice how these two things, and also my healing, relate in a way that is absolutely in line with what Hersey shares in this book. While I had access to sleep that absolutely relates to my privilege, and I in fact slept a ton, I also spent more than a decade in total denial about my lack of access to rest. By placing myself on the privileged side of a binary, I didn’t give myself access to a birthright that is an important part of liberation for all people, or allow myself to see how sleeping was not the same as resting.
In my mid-twenties I’d wake up early, spend three hours catching naps on public transportation commuting from the apartment I could afford to my job, spend a 9-10 hour workday stressed and trying to operate like a neurotypical person, shove whatever food I could find in my face at the train station while berating myself for both spending money on food and eating food that didn’t support my body, commute-nap my way home again, and crawl into bed for the 10 hours of sleep I required to be even minimally functional. Hobbies and minimal chores were for the weekend, where I’d mostly be online.
Relationships with other humans? Sorry, no time. Presence, reflection, movement practice? Well I might be annoyed at myself for not being able to “fit it in,” but that’s about it. And yet, I didn’t see that this state was unacceptable, because it’s so common. As Hersey writes: ”When you are exhausted, you lack clarity and the ability to see deeply. Your intuition and imagination are stifled by a culture of overworking and disconnection.”
Even when I was able to cut out the commute, I was still in a constantly mental mode—thinking, planning, annoyed at myself for not following logical pathways. ”In our culture we live in our heads always ready to theorize, analyze, and make sense out of everything. In rest and dreaming, we surrender to the unknown.” In retrospect I can see how I was tied up in specific stories of self, rather than open to possibility, and thus missing the generative power of this unknown. Hersey recognizes where we are, but also holds fierce belief in where we could go. ”We may never get to a fully anticapitalist world, but our imagination is resistance. Imagination is a form of care.”
When I was in this cycle of sleep and burnout-levels of work, I understood that human connection was good for me, but it was also hard to stay engaged. I was always just so damn tired! And as the fatigue got worse over the years, I started even working from my bed. Meanwhile, doctors laughed at my predicament and told me that most people would kill to sleep twelve hours a night!
Because we live in such a sleep-deprived culture, in other words, it was impossible for anyone, including me, to see the possibility that I could be sleeping so much and still deprived of rest. It was a story of “you could have it so much worse.”
Which is both true and… kind of irrelevant?
As Hersey explains, ”We internalize the toxic messages received from the culture and begin to hate ourselves unless we are accomplishing a task. We seek external validation from a violent system void of love.” Oof. Preach!
I was totally a rest advocate throughout this time. “Yes, rest!” And I thought I was doing great at it—napping plenty, lying down whenever I felt like it, not setting an alarm even when I’d sleep twelve, sixteen, and at the worst point twenty hours in a row. But I needed a more nuanced approach like Hersey’s, taking into account body relationship, spirit, and this more holistic understanding of rest as something that is systematically de-prioritized in a capitalist culture.
In the book, Hersey explores rest itself but also looks at dreaming, resistance, imagination through the lens of rest—what does rest make possible? What is the purpose of rest? How can rest help us to come home to ourselves and find what we’re meant for, to set healthy boundaries, to refuse grind culture? “What miraculous moments are you missing because you aren’t resting?”
There are a lot of books out now, and more coming out every month, about resisting capitalism, hustle culture, and the stressors of a life spent online. Hersey’s contribution enters this canon through engagement with ancestral medicine, rest as a creative space, and the specificity of Black experience, with a real Afrofuturist / emergent strategy vibe. Black readers will find encouragement to tap into the power of their ancestral resilience, while simultaneously refusing the outrageous demands we make on the labor of Black folks (and in particular Black women and femmes.)
Hersey’s writing also engages repetition in a way that may frustrate some more linear readers, but to me this style has the healing power of a sermon, appropriate as she offers the book explicitly as a prayer. As the Nap Minister, Hersey also offers the unique lens of having facilitated hundreds of collective napping experiences, bringing rest beyond the individual. Her work is full of calls to action, prompts, and reflections for the curious reader.
I love how Hersey frames rest as natural state that we all deserve and that our bodies know how to come back to, as an empowering place: “Once we know and remember we are divine, we will not participate and allow anything into our hearts and minds that is not loving and caring. We would treat ourselves and each other like the tender and powerful beings that we are.”
When I was sleeping so much, and still not getting much done, I felt guilty for my own ineptitude and inability to figure it out, but now that I’ve experienced the difference in cognitive quality when I have actually restful sleep, it’s no wonder I was struggling! I also can see how my experience of lacking rest was intimately entangled with the stress of my schedule, and the expectations of work and my peers. Hersey explains: ”Grinding keeps us in a cycle of trauma; rest disturbs and disrupts this cycle. Rest is an ethos of reclaiming your body as your own. Rest provides a portal for healing, imagination, and communication with our DreamSpace.” Simply sleeping doesn’t mean accessing this portal.
The funny thing is, despite all my struggles it turns out I need roughly 8-9 hours of sleep a night like the average adult. But I also need to sit or stand or be moving throughout the entire day to avoid falling into restless, non-nourishing sleep that my body doesn’t actually need. My rest needs are highly personal, logically counterintuitive, and I didn’t discover them through medical care.
It was actually my own spiritual, healing, and justice practice that led me to greater body awareness, to a playfulness in exploring and getting curious, to an ability to observe and re-build relationship with my body, and ultimately to a holistic view that enabled me to connect the dots.
I figured out my sleep condition on a trip I’d been terrified of because it would require me to be active, including two 12-hour drives, at a time when I could barely sit up for an hour without feeling an urgent need to collapse. I couldn’t be roused from sleep to save my life, and suffered long and frequent bouts of terrifying sleep paralysis, where I’d know I wanted to wake up but couldn’t physically move. A couple of days before my trip, I asked a partner to wake me at a certain time, trying to get my body clock somehow calibrated for the drive down, and I apparently had an entire conversation where they thought they’d successfully woken me up, but I was actually just sleep talking!
And yet somehow, I not only survived the trip but thrived. I found way more energy than I had in nearly a year, and while I was wiped by the end of each day I was able to wake up relatively easily in the morning. A few lovely synchronicities led me from this surprising empirical evidence to a name for my condition, which I primarily manage through staying upright all the time and never, ever allowing myself to recline or get my body super comfortable during the day.
This would’ve sounded hellish in the past! But it actually allows me access to energy I haven’t had since age 15. For the first time in my entire life I feel rested after just eight hours of sleep. My metabolism also naturally adjusted once I was sleeping less, which led to a whole other array of symptoms doctors had paid more attention to than the oversleep falling away on their own.
Obviously, most people who are tired aren’t going to have the experience I had, and a lot of people experiencing sleep deprivation are also pushing against tremendous burdens I have never had to experience. But at the same time, I think my story is a great example of the possibilities available when we look for space inside of ourselves, institute even a small and simple practice of body awareness, and are willing to get curious about where our mental stories might not be serving.
When I work with clients we often discover inherited or learned narratives that create restrictive boundaries falling somewhere short of “actually required.” Hersey points, for example, to the common objection “I can’t rest because I need to earn a living!” But in response to this claim that rest is unrealistic, Hersey simply offers, “I am grateful to not be realistic and for the legacy of imagination and trickster energy shown to me by my Ancestors.” While acknowledging real challenges, she also encourages play, creativity, and refusal even when it seems impossible.
Personally, I was holding a story of justice and liberation looking like self-sacrifice, as a white person. Through my healing justice journey, I’ve explored the limitations of this narrow story. The fact is that worldbuilding is about small acts at a personal level. One of these acts, even as someone who benefits from privilege, was honoring my own personal version of rest.
Hersey reminds us: “We are grind culture. Grind culture is our everyday behaviors, expectations, and engagements with each other and the world around us.” White folks are a huge part of the ongoing and active construction of grind culture, so we also need to be part of dismantling it.
While my rest didn’t call me to trust my dreams in the way that Hersey suggests, as I still experience incredibly violent dreams and periodically even skip a night’s sleep just to get rest from that terror, reclaiming rest has made it more possible for me to hold what is mine, and only what is mine. It has also allowed me to see the ways in which I’ve denied myself a right to rest—for example, struggling to acknowledge my ADHD and autistic burnout. When Hersey writes about the trauma of kids being indoctrinated into grind culture, and encourages “napping when the entire culture calls you lazy,” I feel the neurodivergent trauma (and neuroemergent possibility) in my bones.
These days I honor rest by allowing for flexibility in schedules, indulging in dance breaks, and refusing to market myself in most of the ways I’ve been told I must do or I will fail. I honor rest by trusting that the “impossible” will happen, and that I will be able to meet my material needs when my current savings run out, even though I can’t see a path to that right now—rather than shifting course and putting down my current spacious rhythms to return to the grind.
Hersey encourages this ambiguity and uncertainty: “We don’t have to have a complete answer to everything right now. We don’t have to know everything. We don’t have to be everything. We don’t have to do everything. There is space for the unknown. There is space for curiosity and mystery. There is space to just allow rest to settle and answer the questions for us.” She beautifully admits, ”I know that my visualizations of what a world without capitalism and oppression look like is based on something I have never experienced in this lifetime. It is dreamwork and alchemy.” This is incredibly resonant with my own experience as an anti-capitalist business owner, experimenting and trusting despite the lack of concrete evidence that I can succeed.
Hersey repeats over and over in this book that she is not donating her body to capitalism, that oppressive systems cannot have her. “I will never donate my body to a system that views it as only a tool for its production. I need you to begin to slowly feel this and to declare that the systems can’t have you. It will take deep work but it’s imaginative and beautiful work that will be a lifelong process.”
Hell, yes. I am committed! Perhaps my business will unfold in a way I can’t currently see. And perhaps, as another possibility, I won’t be able to stay in the spaciousness of my current life, and I’ll need to work for others again, but that doesn’t have to be a death sentence. I’m inspired by Hersey’s question, “Why isn’t our rest powerful enough to be accessed anytime and anywhere?” and open to the possibility that there are ways to rest that I can’t currently imagine.
One of the most beautiful things about Hersey’s viewpoint is how she frames rest as a “meticulous love practice.” She writes, “[t[he amount of connected and intentional rest we can embody becomes a lifeboat on a raging sea. It pours into our capacity to allow for the act of care and love to save us.” I have certainly found that rest allows me to both give and receive more care, and to desire connection in the way that I once craved isolation.
One of the most profound and difficult practices of self-care, in my view, is allowing space for simply being—a space that is generative in a completely different way than “productivity” claims to be. ”Resting is about getting people back to their truest selves. To what they were before capitalism robbed you of your ability to just be.”
When I reclaimed my energy, personally, I was excited about more hours to do things, to build a business from my passions. But even when focused on passion, I had to reckon with the fact that rest is a slow, cyclical never-ending process. The end of my fatigue issues wasn’t a conclusion, but more of a start. I re-committed myself to my new business with gusto on the wings of new energy and ended up going through many cycles of learning around my energy, having to go slower and slower and even slower even though I had physical energy again.
My plans and visions strangely led to very little for quite a while—few connections, growing visibility, or interest in my work, despite how excited I was to share it. In retrospect, though, I can see the blessing of space to learn and confront remaining internalized beliefs. Clearing some of those cobwebs from the closet allowed me to see what came forth from a space of “just being.”
As is likely no surprise, I highly recommend this book as a potential frame to help you see your own path to radical trust in the seemingly impossible and as an ally to affirm your refusal to work in service of systems that are killing you, especially if you’re a Black woman or non-binary person. The style is healing and poetic, and the conversations it will inspire will surely be life changing!
”Resting is not a state of inactivity or a waste of time. Rest is a generative space. When you are resting your body, it is in its most connected state. Your organs are regenerating. Your brain is processing new information. You are connecting with a spiritual practice. You are honoring your body. You are being present. All these things are so foundational for liberation and healing to take root.”
Let’s start planting some seeds together.
[ARC provided through NetGalley.]
April 16, 2023
Sadly, this was not for me. I found the message fine and noble: Rest is a means of fighting capitalistic, patriarchal, and white supremacist systems of injury, injustice, predation, and abuse. Grand. Agreed, 100%.
What I couldn't handle was the unbridled degree of repetition in this short, but not short enough, manifesto. I had to have read some variation of "rest is about fighting grind culture" literally hundreds of times, along with "white supremacy denies us the DreamSpace" and others.
A disorganized collection of slight variations on the same idea make up pretty much 90% of this book. The points were absolutely HAMMERED home. This could have been 11 pages long and I'd have been thrilled.
At a certain point, I had to ask, why is the author shouting down the message over and over and over? The only people who were going to make it past 20 pages of this were the folks already in the choir. And yeah--it was preachy. I fully get that the author is pulling from black liberation theology. But with daily news about theocracy-related oppression happening, to women and LGBTQ individuals especially, this language doesn't sit well with me at all.
It's interesting--I'd just listened to a podcast about the abomination that was "Rich Dad, Poor Dad," whose author loved to say, "Pay yourself first." When asked, "Well, what if I can't afford my bills?" or "What if the IRS comes after me?" his answer was a dodge: It won't happen if you just...pay yourself first.
I got echoes of a similar tautology here. If it is systems that are denying us rest, forcing us to grind to live, why is the prescription, mentioned time and time again here, one of individual matters? We know burnout is a symptom of a damaged system, but we keep shoving "SeLf-CaRe!!" in people's faces. In one 10- or 15-page span she rails against expensive wellness retreats, then goes on to describe participating in and leading them. She describes "snatching rest" where one can--baths, especially, come up frequently and struck me as the most impractical of suggestions. Napping. Daydreaming. 10-minute walk breaks. Etc.
This is all fine and dandy but I just couldn't help but think about the Amazon warehouse worker who's not allowed bathroom breaks let alone daydreaming time, or the delivery driver who can't even sip water while on the road. I thought about all the single parents who can't laze away in a bathtub while their kids need watching, and all the double- and triple-shift healthcare workers who don't nap to rest, they nap to literally survive 18 hours of work that they have to get up and repeat in 6 hours, or the so severely underpaid they have to work three jobs just to eat. It's really all well and good to tell people to resist the capitalist oppressors by reclaiming rest, but in my head while reading I just kept screaming, "HOW, DAMNIT?!"
If this was written for the above kinda folks, it fails, completely. If it was written for the worried well office worker who just can't put their phone down while climbing the corporate ladder, or the soccer mom whose mommy groups and extended family are constantly judging them for every choice while they're doing the best they possibly can without going completely insane, ok then. Market it as such, a manifesto in support of quiet quitting. But to tell everyone to "just rest" is as disingenuous as telling the poor to "pay yourself first" and as damaging as telling the depressed to "just smile more."
Let's face it: Rest is an absolute luxury. The message here is that it shouldn't be. Again, agreed, 100%. But to tell people to just do it anyway is disillusioned. It's insulting. You "daydream" at some jobs, you get fired. You daydream at home, your kid touches the hot stove or walks out the back door and disappears. There are states with bills on the docket right now that would eliminate mandatory water breaks for outdoor construction workers. Water breaks! There is absolute madness happening at the upper levels of our systems that won't be solved by telling the oppressed to not do their jobs for a little while.
I have heard all of this before, and I'm really looking forward to finding some nonfiction books about wellness that bring some new ideas to the table.
What I couldn't handle was the unbridled degree of repetition in this short, but not short enough, manifesto. I had to have read some variation of "rest is about fighting grind culture" literally hundreds of times, along with "white supremacy denies us the DreamSpace" and others.
A disorganized collection of slight variations on the same idea make up pretty much 90% of this book. The points were absolutely HAMMERED home. This could have been 11 pages long and I'd have been thrilled.
At a certain point, I had to ask, why is the author shouting down the message over and over and over? The only people who were going to make it past 20 pages of this were the folks already in the choir. And yeah--it was preachy. I fully get that the author is pulling from black liberation theology. But with daily news about theocracy-related oppression happening, to women and LGBTQ individuals especially, this language doesn't sit well with me at all.
It's interesting--I'd just listened to a podcast about the abomination that was "Rich Dad, Poor Dad," whose author loved to say, "Pay yourself first." When asked, "Well, what if I can't afford my bills?" or "What if the IRS comes after me?" his answer was a dodge: It won't happen if you just...pay yourself first.
I got echoes of a similar tautology here. If it is systems that are denying us rest, forcing us to grind to live, why is the prescription, mentioned time and time again here, one of individual matters? We know burnout is a symptom of a damaged system, but we keep shoving "SeLf-CaRe!!" in people's faces. In one 10- or 15-page span she rails against expensive wellness retreats, then goes on to describe participating in and leading them. She describes "snatching rest" where one can--baths, especially, come up frequently and struck me as the most impractical of suggestions. Napping. Daydreaming. 10-minute walk breaks. Etc.
This is all fine and dandy but I just couldn't help but think about the Amazon warehouse worker who's not allowed bathroom breaks let alone daydreaming time, or the delivery driver who can't even sip water while on the road. I thought about all the single parents who can't laze away in a bathtub while their kids need watching, and all the double- and triple-shift healthcare workers who don't nap to rest, they nap to literally survive 18 hours of work that they have to get up and repeat in 6 hours, or the so severely underpaid they have to work three jobs just to eat. It's really all well and good to tell people to resist the capitalist oppressors by reclaiming rest, but in my head while reading I just kept screaming, "HOW, DAMNIT?!"
If this was written for the above kinda folks, it fails, completely. If it was written for the worried well office worker who just can't put their phone down while climbing the corporate ladder, or the soccer mom whose mommy groups and extended family are constantly judging them for every choice while they're doing the best they possibly can without going completely insane, ok then. Market it as such, a manifesto in support of quiet quitting. But to tell everyone to "just rest" is as disingenuous as telling the poor to "pay yourself first" and as damaging as telling the depressed to "just smile more."
Let's face it: Rest is an absolute luxury. The message here is that it shouldn't be. Again, agreed, 100%. But to tell people to just do it anyway is disillusioned. It's insulting. You "daydream" at some jobs, you get fired. You daydream at home, your kid touches the hot stove or walks out the back door and disappears. There are states with bills on the docket right now that would eliminate mandatory water breaks for outdoor construction workers. Water breaks! There is absolute madness happening at the upper levels of our systems that won't be solved by telling the oppressed to not do their jobs for a little while.
I have heard all of this before, and I'm really looking forward to finding some nonfiction books about wellness that bring some new ideas to the table.
November 27, 2022
Okay I agree with the concept of this book that rest can help heal your body and mind. Yep, I’m on board. And I have been resting more since I heard Tricia on a podcast. I’m not normally this critical of a book. BUT I just had to start skimming it because she repeated herself over and over and over. The book could have been 100 pages less and still had the exact same information in it. And I will blame this on her publisher/editor. This book didn’t cut things out and organize it. Each section’s information also included information from other sections so it all bled together and was sooooo repetitive. I feel like they also could have created a much more interesting cover (someone sleeping/meditating) that would have caught someone’s eye better. The cover uses fonts and colors from the 80’s. It’s a shame, really. Hopefully the message will still be able to be dissected to people, just wish it was in a much cleaner and simpler format.
February 13, 2023
I really wanted to like this book because of the positive reviews and my interest in the author's other work regarding rest, but it could have been just an essay. The concepts discussed in this book are brilliant, but the overuse of the words capitalism,white supremacy,and ableism is problematic. Together, these words would make up more than half of the book if we added up their usage.
Even though the first two chapters were difficult to read, I forced myself to skim them for the most important ideas. The irony of the book being about rest but being tiresome to read is funny, so I speed-read the other chapters.
Other things I noticed:
The ideas of capitalism, white supremacy, and ableism are not adequately defined or supported by a substantial body of research. Knowing people of color are not treated fairly by the system and are abused by it, how can we change this while still prioritizing rest and preventing burnout? What practical methods for incorporating rest are available? What is ableism and its effects in terms of capitalism?
These are the concepts I wish she mentioned. The questions she asked were not well answered and led to confusion.
Despite claims that her editor failed her, in my opinion, the author should concentrate on making points instead of worrying about how short her writing may be. Words should not control her thoughts, but vice versa.
Even though the first two chapters were difficult to read, I forced myself to skim them for the most important ideas. The irony of the book being about rest but being tiresome to read is funny, so I speed-read the other chapters.
Other things I noticed:
The ideas of capitalism, white supremacy, and ableism are not adequately defined or supported by a substantial body of research. Knowing people of color are not treated fairly by the system and are abused by it, how can we change this while still prioritizing rest and preventing burnout? What practical methods for incorporating rest are available? What is ableism and its effects in terms of capitalism?
These are the concepts I wish she mentioned. The questions she asked were not well answered and led to confusion.
Despite claims that her editor failed her, in my opinion, the author should concentrate on making points instead of worrying about how short her writing may be. Words should not control her thoughts, but vice versa.
February 17, 2023
Clickbait.
There is nothing restful about this book. It’s clickbait for fiery sermons from an African American Christian Woman.
A better option is Take a Nap! Change Your Life..
DNF 30% Returned to Audible for a refund.
There is nothing restful about this book. It’s clickbait for fiery sermons from an African American Christian Woman.
A better option is Take a Nap! Change Your Life..
DNF 30% Returned to Audible for a refund.
November 25, 2022
I want to rate this book higher because Hersey's ideas and vision are powerful and positive and needed...But the writing was not. This could have been a truly excellent 50-100 page book, with the presentation of her ideas tightened and the flow improved. But at 195 pages, it was repetitive and, after the first 30 pages, dull, with multiple points made in one paragraph and the same multiple points made in every parallel thereafter. The book does a disservice to Hersey's vision.
November 30, 2022
Love this concept, and I've been following this author's work for a while, particularly on Instagram. Like others have noted, I'm not totally sure the structure/writing style really worked great here. It felt a bit repetitive and I'm not totally sure there was enough here to be stretched into a full book--at least not in terms of what we got--but I'm glad to have read it.
August 18, 2022
The dangers of rest to the dominant paradigm have been well known for millennia. Aesop and other writers described the story of the “Ant and the Grasshopper” as a cautionary tale. For hundreds of years – strikes and work stoppages have been the primary means of resisting the demands of productivity demanded by Capital. People put down their tools and walked off the job and out the factory doors. Truck drivers block ports with their vehicles. Work stoppage has long been a means of resisting the dehumanizing effects of capitalism.
“Capitalism commodifies whatever it can and doesn’t allow space for us to experience the full spectrum of being human.”
“We are socialized into systems that cause us to conform and believe our worth is connected to how much we can produce.”
“Fear and scarcity are a big part of how the culture keeps us bound up in the hamster wheel.”
Tricia Hersey’s new book is part auto-biography, part history book and part sermon, offering us a lens for resistance of the dehumanizing, deleterious effects of capitalism & the cult of “productivity” that is womanist, liberationist and at the same time deeply validating of both the need to disconnect for dreaming & private thoughts and of community.
Hersey makes her keen observations in a style of a song: intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, outro.
She doesn’t need to expand too much on her verses – it’s not novel information for her audience. It’s the repetition and the chorus – the soothing reassurance that “You are not unworthy. The systems are unworthy.”
Deep inside, people know:
“ we didn’t arrive on Earth to be a tool for a capitalist system.” … It is not our divine purpose. […] You were not just born to center your entire existence on work and labor.”
The effects of this fatigue remove community and intellectual agency – turning us into machines:
“When you are exhausted, you lack clarity and the ability to see deeply. Your intuition and imagination are stifled by a culture of overworking and disconnection."
“[…] stealing your imagination and time, grind culture has stolen the ability for pleasure, hobbies, leisure, and experimentation.”
Black liberation and womanism are woven throughout the book – her message that “Black liberation is human liberation” is strong and consistent. The goal of capitalism and white supremacy is to strip away the humanity – it’s essentially reductionist and isolating.
“Black liberation is a balm for all humanity and this message is for all those suffering from the ways of white supremacy and capitalism.”
If you are reading this book and feel that the topics of white supremacy and black liberation are a bit heavy – you have a lot more work to do before you can well and truly appreciate what is being communicated in this book.
The goal of this work is to decolonize your mind and enable a culture shift. If your reaction to creating a nap practice, making time for day dreaming or resting as resistance is to immediately think of slackers, freeloaders and laziness – you’re falling into racist stereotypes as well as white supremacist programming.
“We have been bamboozled. This is why it’s so critical that we create systems of care to help people dismantle and decolonize their minds.”
“We are resting not to do more and to come back stronger and more productive for a capitalist system.”
The loudest chorus in this book is that you don’t have to always be “productive” – and that busyness reduces your ability to heal, dream and tap into your imagination. Even Hersey’s grandmother would rest with her eyes closed and reminded her granddaughter that every shut eye was not asleep. We close our eyes to reduce distraction and focus inward on our own experience whether it’s breathing in meditation or processing feelings or enjoying the fragrance of a flower (to name a few).
- “Resting is not a state of inactivity or a waste of time. Rest is a generative space.”
- “Naps provide a portal to imagine, invent, and heal.”
- “Rest is not a luxury, privilege, or a bonus we must wait for once we are burned out.”
- “Rest is not a privilege because our bodies are still our own, no matter what the current systems teach us.”
- “Your bodies don’t belong to capitalism, to white supremacy, or to the patriarchy.”
Social media is another area covered by various choruses throughout the book. Just as a reminder: where anything is “free” – you are the product. Hersey rightly points out that social media is a marketing tool and an extension of capitalism. “The goal is to keep you scrolling long enough that you become a consumer. The goal is for you to buy, buy some more, and stay on as long as possible until that happens.” Social media “is a space of dependency” and “robbing us of the archives and memory. Taking from us the ability to go to the past for guidance, motivation, and grounding.”
Hersey highlights the disruptive nature of social media and how it has absorbed “our quiet time” – and urges us to “detox intentionally and often if we are to find rest.”
Our challenge is to “spiritually disconnect from the shenanigans of grind culture while physically still living in it.” Establish healthy boundaries, resist responding right away to email or social media. Reject urgency.
“You cannot achieve deep rest in a consistent way if we don’t detox regularly from social media and the internet. Technology is not built to support our rest or make space for our rest.”
Finally – you have to accept that you have been brainwashed. You have been swimming in a pool of the dominant paradigm for so long, there’s no way it could be any other way. The repetition in this book serves a purpose – to begin unspooling the cocoon that has been limiting us for so long so that we can claim our birthright.
We are enough just as we are – we are enough because we exist. We do not have to be productive, busy or constantly contributing. There is no quick fix – dismantling millennia old mindsets and building communities of care takes time.
“Our interconnectedness is a form of resistance in times thriving against the dehumanizing ways capitalism and white supremacy sees the world.”
“We will not heal alone. We will not thrive alone. Communal care is our saving grace and our communion. Community care will save us. It is already saving us.”
Hersey offers some places to begin:
- Intentionally and regularly detox from social media
- Learn boundaries – “heal the individual trauma you have experienced that makes it difficult for you to say no”
- Establish a “daily practice in daydreaming”
- “Slow down”
- “Listen more”
- “Create systems of community care”
Print out this quote and stick it up in your environment in a half dozen places:
“I deserve to rest now. 2. I am worthy of rest. 3. I am not lazy. How could I be lazy? My Ancestors are too brilliant for that. 4. Capitalism wants my body to be a machine. I am not a machine. 5. I am a magical and divine human being. 6. I have the right to resist grind culture. 7. I don’t have to earn rest. 8. Do less, watch how I thrive. 9. Ease is my birthright. 10. I Will Rest!”
“You don’t have to wait on permission from the dominant culture.”
“Grind culture is violence. Resist participating in it.”
“Capitalism commodifies whatever it can and doesn’t allow space for us to experience the full spectrum of being human.”
“We are socialized into systems that cause us to conform and believe our worth is connected to how much we can produce.”
“Fear and scarcity are a big part of how the culture keeps us bound up in the hamster wheel.”
Tricia Hersey’s new book is part auto-biography, part history book and part sermon, offering us a lens for resistance of the dehumanizing, deleterious effects of capitalism & the cult of “productivity” that is womanist, liberationist and at the same time deeply validating of both the need to disconnect for dreaming & private thoughts and of community.
Hersey makes her keen observations in a style of a song: intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, outro.
She doesn’t need to expand too much on her verses – it’s not novel information for her audience. It’s the repetition and the chorus – the soothing reassurance that “You are not unworthy. The systems are unworthy.”
Deep inside, people know:
“ we didn’t arrive on Earth to be a tool for a capitalist system.” … It is not our divine purpose. […] You were not just born to center your entire existence on work and labor.”
The effects of this fatigue remove community and intellectual agency – turning us into machines:
“When you are exhausted, you lack clarity and the ability to see deeply. Your intuition and imagination are stifled by a culture of overworking and disconnection."
“[…] stealing your imagination and time, grind culture has stolen the ability for pleasure, hobbies, leisure, and experimentation.”
Black liberation and womanism are woven throughout the book – her message that “Black liberation is human liberation” is strong and consistent. The goal of capitalism and white supremacy is to strip away the humanity – it’s essentially reductionist and isolating.
“Black liberation is a balm for all humanity and this message is for all those suffering from the ways of white supremacy and capitalism.”
If you are reading this book and feel that the topics of white supremacy and black liberation are a bit heavy – you have a lot more work to do before you can well and truly appreciate what is being communicated in this book.
The goal of this work is to decolonize your mind and enable a culture shift. If your reaction to creating a nap practice, making time for day dreaming or resting as resistance is to immediately think of slackers, freeloaders and laziness – you’re falling into racist stereotypes as well as white supremacist programming.
“We have been bamboozled. This is why it’s so critical that we create systems of care to help people dismantle and decolonize their minds.”
“We are resting not to do more and to come back stronger and more productive for a capitalist system.”
The loudest chorus in this book is that you don’t have to always be “productive” – and that busyness reduces your ability to heal, dream and tap into your imagination. Even Hersey’s grandmother would rest with her eyes closed and reminded her granddaughter that every shut eye was not asleep. We close our eyes to reduce distraction and focus inward on our own experience whether it’s breathing in meditation or processing feelings or enjoying the fragrance of a flower (to name a few).
- “Resting is not a state of inactivity or a waste of time. Rest is a generative space.”
- “Naps provide a portal to imagine, invent, and heal.”
- “Rest is not a luxury, privilege, or a bonus we must wait for once we are burned out.”
- “Rest is not a privilege because our bodies are still our own, no matter what the current systems teach us.”
- “Your bodies don’t belong to capitalism, to white supremacy, or to the patriarchy.”
Social media is another area covered by various choruses throughout the book. Just as a reminder: where anything is “free” – you are the product. Hersey rightly points out that social media is a marketing tool and an extension of capitalism. “The goal is to keep you scrolling long enough that you become a consumer. The goal is for you to buy, buy some more, and stay on as long as possible until that happens.” Social media “is a space of dependency” and “robbing us of the archives and memory. Taking from us the ability to go to the past for guidance, motivation, and grounding.”
Hersey highlights the disruptive nature of social media and how it has absorbed “our quiet time” – and urges us to “detox intentionally and often if we are to find rest.”
Our challenge is to “spiritually disconnect from the shenanigans of grind culture while physically still living in it.” Establish healthy boundaries, resist responding right away to email or social media. Reject urgency.
“You cannot achieve deep rest in a consistent way if we don’t detox regularly from social media and the internet. Technology is not built to support our rest or make space for our rest.”
Finally – you have to accept that you have been brainwashed. You have been swimming in a pool of the dominant paradigm for so long, there’s no way it could be any other way. The repetition in this book serves a purpose – to begin unspooling the cocoon that has been limiting us for so long so that we can claim our birthright.
We are enough just as we are – we are enough because we exist. We do not have to be productive, busy or constantly contributing. There is no quick fix – dismantling millennia old mindsets and building communities of care takes time.
“Our interconnectedness is a form of resistance in times thriving against the dehumanizing ways capitalism and white supremacy sees the world.”
“We will not heal alone. We will not thrive alone. Communal care is our saving grace and our communion. Community care will save us. It is already saving us.”
Hersey offers some places to begin:
- Intentionally and regularly detox from social media
- Learn boundaries – “heal the individual trauma you have experienced that makes it difficult for you to say no”
- Establish a “daily practice in daydreaming”
- “Slow down”
- “Listen more”
- “Create systems of community care”
Print out this quote and stick it up in your environment in a half dozen places:
“I deserve to rest now. 2. I am worthy of rest. 3. I am not lazy. How could I be lazy? My Ancestors are too brilliant for that. 4. Capitalism wants my body to be a machine. I am not a machine. 5. I am a magical and divine human being. 6. I have the right to resist grind culture. 7. I don’t have to earn rest. 8. Do less, watch how I thrive. 9. Ease is my birthright. 10. I Will Rest!”
“You don’t have to wait on permission from the dominant culture.”
“Grind culture is violence. Resist participating in it.”
March 19, 2023
[1 Star]
the main point of this manifesto, that rest is a form of resistance against an unsustainable capitalist system, is valid. But the way Hersey makes this argument does a disservice to the strength of her message
Pro:
- the main point
Cons:
- this book is entirely too rambly. Hersey says the same things on loop throughout the entire manifesto, sometimes reusing whole exact sentences, in a very stream-of-consciousness manner. This made the reading experience incredibly frustrating for me. the whole book could have been summed up in one chapter
- despite its repetitive writing, the points that Hersey makes are never substantiated. This book is filled entirely with assertions based on Hersey's own experiences, yet she presents them as if they're universal facts. She never references any data or studies to back up her numerous claims throughout the manifesto. I know that there's a lot of literature out there on this topic and I would have loved to see her make those connections. As the book stands now, her argument is nearly baseless
- this book is also full of buzzwords galore. Capitalism, White Supremacy, Gain Culture, DreamSpace, etc all make NUMEROUS appearances throughout the manifesto. Yet not once are they broken down and explained. Hersey needs to have defined these terms and what she means by them when discussed in the context of her 'Rest as Resistance' movement. Because, while people might be familiar with these concepts in general, they're incredibly complex and multi-dimensional. The ways that people interact with these systems and the way that the systems interact with each other varies based on a variety of factors. For the sake of a strong argument, Hersey needed to have defined and delved into the intricacies of these concepts. Not just rattled them off on repeat
I think there are much better books out there that make this same argument but in a much more effective way
the main point of this manifesto, that rest is a form of resistance against an unsustainable capitalist system, is valid. But the way Hersey makes this argument does a disservice to the strength of her message
Pro:
- the main point
Cons:
- this book is entirely too rambly. Hersey says the same things on loop throughout the entire manifesto, sometimes reusing whole exact sentences, in a very stream-of-consciousness manner. This made the reading experience incredibly frustrating for me. the whole book could have been summed up in one chapter
- despite its repetitive writing, the points that Hersey makes are never substantiated. This book is filled entirely with assertions based on Hersey's own experiences, yet she presents them as if they're universal facts. She never references any data or studies to back up her numerous claims throughout the manifesto. I know that there's a lot of literature out there on this topic and I would have loved to see her make those connections. As the book stands now, her argument is nearly baseless
- this book is also full of buzzwords galore. Capitalism, White Supremacy, Gain Culture, DreamSpace, etc all make NUMEROUS appearances throughout the manifesto. Yet not once are they broken down and explained. Hersey needs to have defined these terms and what she means by them when discussed in the context of her 'Rest as Resistance' movement. Because, while people might be familiar with these concepts in general, they're incredibly complex and multi-dimensional. The ways that people interact with these systems and the way that the systems interact with each other varies based on a variety of factors. For the sake of a strong argument, Hersey needed to have defined and delved into the intricacies of these concepts. Not just rattled them off on repeat
I think there are much better books out there that make this same argument but in a much more effective way
October 28, 2022
In the beginning, I thought is this coming from a privileged individual: because sincerely as much as I'm all about balance and rest I do recognize how certain if not most structures have made it impossible for a wide range of society. It's only by the last chapters that the author shares her story and the puzzle did fit perfectly.
So this is a manifesto, it's more about what the author aspires to rather than what's in lace, it's about being hopeful and sharing an alternative to the present.
I honestly love my texts backed with data (a bit similar to what Arianna wrote about here Thrive: The Third Metric to Redefining Success and Creating a Life of Well-Being, Wisdom, and Wonder
In any case, worth the listen!
So this is a manifesto, it's more about what the author aspires to rather than what's in lace, it's about being hopeful and sharing an alternative to the present.
I honestly love my texts backed with data (a bit similar to what Arianna wrote about here Thrive: The Third Metric to Redefining Success and Creating a Life of Well-Being, Wisdom, and Wonder
In any case, worth the listen!
January 1, 2023
"I wonder what our bodies can do in this dimension and this time from a rested and imaginative space. What could we heal? What could we figure out? How would our justice work look different if all involved were not sleep-deprived? What transmissions could we receive in our dreams that can guide us to liberation? What insight could our Ancestors provide when we connect with them in our dreams? What revelations are we missing out on because we are navigating our life from a machine-like pace?"
p.160
Hersey zeroes in on the need, reasons and spiritual consequences of rest and slowing-down. She explains the politics of refusal. Her writing is immaculate and her reasoning is clear. Some reviewers note some repetitiveness. I think she would say; "Exactly!"
Physical copy from my library
p.160
Hersey zeroes in on the need, reasons and spiritual consequences of rest and slowing-down. She explains the politics of refusal. Her writing is immaculate and her reasoning is clear. Some reviewers note some repetitiveness. I think she would say; "Exactly!"
Physical copy from my library
February 9, 2023
Although this work came to feel repetitive by halfway through due to consistent restating of the same ideas in slightly different wording, this is an important, transformational perspective on liberating ourselves from the oppressive nature of capitalism and white supremacy. As a white disabled woman who has often felt demeaned and devalued by my inability to perform in a capitalist system, I have come to realize that my only hope for liberation from crushing oppression is to join forces and fight for collective liberation. We are all interconnected and cannot leave anyone behind. This manifesto is powerful inspiration and encouragement for envisioning a world in which liberation is reality.
October 25, 2022
Reads like a spoken word poem, mixed with a sermon, mixed with a history lesson.
I hope this message reaches many, we all need to give ourselves permission to rest. I'd love to live in a culture where we talk about how indulgent our rest practices are rather than how proud we are to be exploited and overworked.
Important and thought provoking.
I hope this message reaches many, we all need to give ourselves permission to rest. I'd love to live in a culture where we talk about how indulgent our rest practices are rather than how proud we are to be exploited and overworked.
Important and thought provoking.
January 11, 2023
This is a liberating read that I will turn to often when grind culture takes over.
April 15, 2023
grind culture. it kind of faded after covid for me.
but I remember being shamed for taking a nap… recently I’ve discovered yin yoga similar to “rest yoga”. after reading this book all I want is to lay in the sun on an outdoor bean bag lounge chair to “imagine, invent and heal”.
but I remember being shamed for taking a nap… recently I’ve discovered yin yoga similar to “rest yoga”. after reading this book all I want is to lay in the sun on an outdoor bean bag lounge chair to “imagine, invent and heal”.
March 4, 2024
I AM NOT A MACHINE!!!!!!!!!!
February 5, 2023
Rooted in womanist, anti-racist, Black liberation tradition, Tricia Hersey's message of rest as resistance runs directly counter to white supremacist patriarchal capitalism. It demands that all people, especially historically oppressed and exploited people, reclaim their souls and their bodies by choosing to rest. This goes against all we have been taught in a culture that sacrifices our bodies, especially Black bodies, on the altar of profit. Learning how to be alone with ourselves, feel our feelings, connect to our souls, and to give ourselves rest is extremely difficult and contradicts our culture and our training. It can't be done without a whole lot of learning and unlearning that Hersey, the Nap Bishop, has thoroughly and clearly laid out in her book.
I've been following The Nap Ministry on social media for a few years and she has been a guiding light. This book came to me at a perfect time. I was and am overworked, burning out, struggling with my health, and trying to find my way back to myself. I have been reading and grappling deeply with my own inner landscape and history as well as the history and depth of the systemic racism baked into this country's foundation and therefore all our histories. I was more than ready to hear this message; I was starving for it. It nourished my soul and gave me a path to follow for the sake of myself and everyone I interact with.
Her excellent writing beautifully displayed her history in poetry and the depth of her research, powerfully persuasive and motivating. Her vulnerability and clarity is incredibly compelling. Her commitment to this work and belief in this message shows through in every sentence. I want everyone to read this book and let their lives be changed by its message.
**update** I read the reviews of other readers and wanted to speak to the structure of the book. I would characterize it by the phrase "some things bear repeating". The cyclical looping in of elements - sharing experience, speaking and repeating truth, educating, speaking and repeating truth, adding another layer, speaking and repeating truth, ongoing - served a very important purpose. If you are looking for fast answers and a list of reasons with a list of steps like many self-help books do, this is not for you. This is an experience of marinating in truth and letting it sink in layer by layer, like a song returns to a chorus after every verse. I thought it was beautifully organized and structured. The critiques that say the structure wasn't for them are fine, but I take issue with them marking the book down or saying the structure is therefore wrong. Some things bear repeating, and some books are best to be marinated in rather than inhaled. I loved the structure and thought it served the book well.
I've been following The Nap Ministry on social media for a few years and she has been a guiding light. This book came to me at a perfect time. I was and am overworked, burning out, struggling with my health, and trying to find my way back to myself. I have been reading and grappling deeply with my own inner landscape and history as well as the history and depth of the systemic racism baked into this country's foundation and therefore all our histories. I was more than ready to hear this message; I was starving for it. It nourished my soul and gave me a path to follow for the sake of myself and everyone I interact with.
Her excellent writing beautifully displayed her history in poetry and the depth of her research, powerfully persuasive and motivating. Her vulnerability and clarity is incredibly compelling. Her commitment to this work and belief in this message shows through in every sentence. I want everyone to read this book and let their lives be changed by its message.
**update** I read the reviews of other readers and wanted to speak to the structure of the book. I would characterize it by the phrase "some things bear repeating". The cyclical looping in of elements - sharing experience, speaking and repeating truth, educating, speaking and repeating truth, adding another layer, speaking and repeating truth, ongoing - served a very important purpose. If you are looking for fast answers and a list of reasons with a list of steps like many self-help books do, this is not for you. This is an experience of marinating in truth and letting it sink in layer by layer, like a song returns to a chorus after every verse. I thought it was beautifully organized and structured. The critiques that say the structure wasn't for them are fine, but I take issue with them marking the book down or saying the structure is therefore wrong. Some things bear repeating, and some books are best to be marinated in rather than inhaled. I loved the structure and thought it served the book well.
January 13, 2023
I am 100% on board with Hersey 's thesis: "Rest is a form of resistance because it disrupts and pushes back against capitalism and white supremacy." I agree with her that, "Grind culture has made us all human machines, willing and ready to donate our lives to a capitalist system that thrives by placing profits over people. The Rest Is Resistance movement is a connection and a path back to our true nature."
I love several quotes throughout the book like this:
"We see care as unnecessary and unimportant. We believe we don't really have to rest. We falsely believe hard work guarantees success in a capitalist system. I have been told this constantly for as long as I can remember. On nights when I worked two jobs, still unable to pay my bills on time or save, I continued to tell myself, "Burn the midnight oil, keep working hard, go to college, find a third job and a side hustle." (24)
My only complaint is that at just under 200 pages, it was repetitive enough to have been edited down into a really solid essay. But her message is so important. Hershey talks about how capitalism has devalued human life and rather than work ourselves to death we need to prioritize rest, resisting the pressure to be another cog in a machine.
I love several quotes throughout the book like this:
"We see care as unnecessary and unimportant. We believe we don't really have to rest. We falsely believe hard work guarantees success in a capitalist system. I have been told this constantly for as long as I can remember. On nights when I worked two jobs, still unable to pay my bills on time or save, I continued to tell myself, "Burn the midnight oil, keep working hard, go to college, find a third job and a side hustle." (24)
My only complaint is that at just under 200 pages, it was repetitive enough to have been edited down into a really solid essay. But her message is so important. Hershey talks about how capitalism has devalued human life and rather than work ourselves to death we need to prioritize rest, resisting the pressure to be another cog in a machine.
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