An important question for you....
What’s your relationship with rest?
Can we invite in an intention is ‘rest and flow’?. And notice, pay attention, when in the opposing lands of that, such as fretting, jaw gripping or busy with all the many ideas birthing, w need to prime ourselves to stop! These patterns take time to unravel the tension we hold in our muscles. Yin, silence, mysteries, madness, shedding old skins and relationships have all featured considerably, in embracing a deep, healing and transformative path.
That has been years in the making! Rest, is indeed, up to you.
And my, there are folk out there who have co-opted this! Twice in the past week, I’ve been drawn to reading about two women, in different parts of the U.S, one who ripped up her old life and went to live in a cabin and met some kind of shamanic man in the woods. The other, describing herself as a rest coach and facilitator for women of colour in leadership roles.
Both very interesting at first. So in both separate instances, I looked at their websites, nodding along to what they were saying and keenly exploring what events they are currently offering out of curiosity.
In both instances, their pricing was astronomical - the rest coach, for one to one work was $8,000 for 3 months of rest coaching which essentially was 3 online sessions and one custom rest practice.
The other references her one to one packages start at $50,000 and her 18 month priestess school was $18,000. What???!
There seems to be an increasing distorted tilt, for people in the ‘wellness’ world to charge soaring prices that personally I find to be unethical and opposite to the true spirit of healing. Yes, of course make a living. Yes of course earn more than you need to, thus being able to help others through philanthropic means. There is however fair play and balance needed.
I know plenty of wonderful people with rich experiences and wide open hearts, from astrologers, to yoga teachers to embodied anatomy educators who would not dream of charging such prices. And they have both competency and perceptive insights in sharing helpful and life changing tools.
When rest gets co-opted to be affordable only to the very rich, we need to remind each other, that we can access the relaxation response. All of us can. All of us, everywhere.
Changing habits and patterns is hard and confronting and upsetting and crazy making.
It does not have cost thousands.
Please know you have the inner resources within you and that small, incremental changes accumulate to your inner transformation. The willingness to embrace a need to slither out of old skins and slip into a new cape of goodness and whole heartedness, is a potent starting point.
We breathe, we move, we feel, we deeply inquire within.
How is your 2025 shaping up? Do you have the mindset that you need to take a holiday from the daily grind? Have you then lost congruence and your relationship to the sacredness that each day contains, whether it’s the agony of loss, the insanity of frustration or the pain of health challenges? All of it reminds us we are alive.
Rest is needed. Life comes with challenge.
The body is always communicating to you. The messages are always there. rest is how we learn to more deeply listen to within.
Our bodies are also made for incredible efficiency and healing.
And healing happens in many forms, often very different to how we think or expect.
The essence of surrender is really the warm honey here.
Surrender to the idea of always doing, always comparing, always thinking, always distracting.
Fall into a benevolent set of arms that will hold you.
You just have to let yourself fall….and trust….
I wrote this in my diary at the start of 2024 and share it with you here. Having a whole calendar year to revisit it helped. What we focus on amplifies.
From Carl Jung’s Red Book:
‘There is only one way, and that is your way. There is only one salvation and that is your salvation…what is to come will be created in you and from you. Hence look into yourself. Do not compare. Do not measure. No other way is like yours….you must fulfill the way that is in you.’
The rest, is up to you….
So much love.
May your bones be strong and your coming days be deeply nurturing.
Ciara Jean Roberts
Wholly Aligned
Writer | Yoga & Embodied Movement Teacher | Nutrition | Sacred Living