Why rest doesn’t feel restful anymore

For so many of us, rest sounds good in theory.

A day off.
An empty calendar.
Time to finally lie down, switch off, do nothing.

And yet, when it arrives, something feels… wrong.

Your body feels restless.
Your mind speeds up instead of slowing down.
You feel edgy, uncomfortable, even anxious.

So you get up.
Tidy something.
Scroll.
Make a cup of tea, then another.
Find something (anything) to do.

And quietly, you wonder what’s wrong with you if even rest doesn’t work anymore.

Nothing is wrong with you.

When rest doesn’t feel safe in the body

One of the most misunderstood things about rest is this:

Rest doesn’t automatically feel restful if your nervous system doesn’t feel safe.

If you’ve spent years pushing through, holding things together, staying busy to cope, your body has learned that movement equals safety.

Stillness can feel unfamiliar.
Quiet can feel exposing.
Slowing down can feel like losing control.

So when you finally stop, your system doesn’t soften, it stays alert.

This isn’t because you’re “bad at resting”.
It’s because your body is doing exactly what it learned to do to keep you going.

Rest isn’t stopping, it’s regulation

Many women I work with tell me they struggle with rest because it feels like collapse.

Like if they stop, they won’t be able to start again.
Like everything they’ve been holding up might fall over.

That’s because rest has often been framed as the opposite of effort, a full stop after running on empty.

But the body doesn’t actually want collapse.
It wants regulation.

Regulation is different.
It’s about gently coming back into balance, not switching off entirely.

Sometimes rest looks like lying down.
Sometimes it looks like a slow walk, a stretch, a quiet cup of tea without multitasking.
Sometimes it’s a few minutes of breathing, journaling, or simply being with yourself without needing to fix anything.

Rest doesn’t have to mean stopping everything.
It can mean meeting your body where it is.

When busyness becomes a coping strategy

Busyness is often labelled as a personality trait.

“I’ve always been busy.”
“I don’t know how to sit still.”
“That’s just how I’m wired.”

But more often than not, busyness is a coping strategy.

A way to avoid uncomfortable sensations, to keep emotions at bay. And a way to feel useful, needed, safe.

And it works… until it doesn’t.

Over time, the body gets tired of being in constant motion, even if the mind insists it’s necessary. That’s when rest starts calling louder, but also feels harder to access.

Softening without force

One of the biggest shifts I see in 1:1 work is this moment of relief when women realise they don’t need to force themselves into rest.

They don’t need to meditate perfectly or to suddenly love stillness.
They don’t need to “do rest better”.

They need gentle support.

Support that helps the body learn, slowly and safely, that it’s okay to soften.
That nothing bad happens when things slow down.
That rest doesn’t mean giving up, it means being held.

This kind of retraining doesn’t happen overnight. It happens in small moments of choice, curiosity and kindness towards yourself.

A quieter way back

If rest hasn’t felt restful for a long time, you’re not broken.

Your system is just asking for something more nuanced than “stop”.

A softer entry.
A steadier pace.
Support alongside you, not another thing to push through alone.

And when rest finally starts to feel like relief instead of resistance, it’s not because you tried harder.

It’s because your body learned it was safe to let go, one gentle moment at a time.