Latest / feel your feelings with Ethan Jewell / 4 ways to rest and be happier

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4 ways to rest and be happier · feel your feelings with Ethan Jewell

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  When you're improving yourself physically, rest is incredibly
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  important. You need to allow yourself rest
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  days to allow muscles to grow, or just your body to recover.
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  Most people know this, it's relatively common knowledge.
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  However, something that most people don't take into
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  consideration is the fact that we need to allow ourselves rest.
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  In the same way when we're trying to improve mentally, when
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  we're trying to reach a different emotional state, and
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  whenever we are going through inner turmoil, rest is one of
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  the most important parts of self improvement.
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  My name is Ethan Jewell and welcome back to another episode
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  of Feel Your Feelings. Over the past eight months, I've
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  been trying to improve myself physically.
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  Now I I've never been one to go to the gym or go on runs or
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  anything like that. It just never really appealed to
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  me. But over the past eight months I
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  have been, I've been going to the gym almost every single day
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  and really committing to bettering myself physically.
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  And it's been a really, really great journey and I've learned a
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  lot of things about myself, both physically and mentally.
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  But one of the biggest things I learned is that you need rest
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  days in order to improve. Physically.
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  I need them. They're non negotiable.
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  When I first started working out, I tried to not take any
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  rest days and I found myself just getting burnt out.
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  I was just sore all the time and I could not improve physically.
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  This was a very important lesson to learn and it allowed me to
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  grow physically in a much more efficient and healthy way.
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  But what I've realized is I very often don't allow myself that
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  same level of mental rest. I've been struggling with mental
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  illnesses for a few years now, and resting is very, very
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  difficult. I find myself feeling guilty for
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  allowing myself to rest whenever I'm having a bad day.
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  If I have a day where I just feel so depressed that I can't
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  get out of bed and I just let myself lay around, guilt
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  literally eats me up inside. I feel like I need to be
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  productive in order to be a functioning member of society.
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  This is a very unhealthy relationship to have with REST,
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  and if this sounds familiar, then this episode is perfect for
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  you. In the same way that rest allows
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  us to physically recover and allows our body to grow and get
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  ready for the next workout, mental rest allows our mind to
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  recover and allows our emotions to calm down and allows us to
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  exit a state of turmoil. Feelings require attention.
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  Feelings and intense emotions require you to sit down and be
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  present with them. And often, in order to be
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  present with our feelings, we need to rest.
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  I struggle with feelings of depression and anxiety, and
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  specifically with anxiety. Whenever I'm caught up in things
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  and I'm going and I'm busy all day, I start to get anxious.
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  I start to get anxious about if I'm doing things right, if I'm
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  going in the right direction in life.
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  I mean, all this anxiety starts stacking up.
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  And what I've found is if I take even 2030 minutes out of my day
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  to just sit with those feelings and think about them and
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  understand them, it helps so, so much.
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  It allows my mind to recover. It allows me to reframe whatever
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  I'm anxious about and it allows me to get a fresh start.
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  Rest is so, so important. So today, let's talk about what
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  types of rest there are and how you can actively apply them to
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  your life in order to have better mental health and to
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  recover emotionally. So I was doing some research for
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  this episode because I want to remind you, I'm not a therapist.
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  I'm not a doctor or a professional in the mental
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  health industry. I'm just a normal guy who's
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  super passionate about mental health.
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  So sometimes I have to do research.
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  Please take everything I say with a grain of salt.
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  Most of this is just from personal experience, but while
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  doing some research I found this this article about nine types of
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  REST. This is by Steph Baron Hall.
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  It's very, very interesting. I would highly recommend
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  checking out all nine types of REST as this is something that
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  is super useful because REST that works for me might not work
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  for you. However, there's four types of
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  REST on this list that really, really resonated with me and I
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  want to share them with you and talk about how you can apply
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  them to your life. Out of these nine types of rest,
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  four really, really resonate with me.
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  The first is permission to not be helpful.
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  If you're anything like me, you're a bit of a people pleaser
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  and you hate to say no and you always want to be helpful.
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  I always, always, always want to be helpful.
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  It's very difficult for me to say no to somebody if they need
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  assistance with something in their life, whether it's moving
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  something or listening to them rant or something like that.
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  Whether it's a physical, mental or emotional help, I always,
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  always jump at the opportunity to be helpful.
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  However, when you help somebody in that way, specifically,
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  mentally or emotionally, you are taking away space from yourself.
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  This isn't a bad thing. It isn't bad to allow space and
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  open up your peace to other people.
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  That's actually a great thing, and it's what makes us human.
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  However, if you're struggling mentally, you need all of the
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  space and all of the energy that you can get for yourself in
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  order to rest and recover, you need that space.
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  You need to allow yourself peace to rest.
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  By giving yourself permission to not be helpful for a period of
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  time, you open up that space and focus all of your energy in to
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  you. This isn't easy to do,
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  especially if you're a people pleaser and you're used to just
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  saying yes. However, creating boundaries for
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  yourself is crucial in order to improve our mental health.
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  Next on the list? Allowing yourself to be
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  unproductive and allowing yourself complete rest without
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  doing anything. Now something that triggers my
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  anxiety is simply not being productive.
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  If I'm not productive, I'm convincing myself that I'm
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  wasting time and that I need to be doing more, and then I'm
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  falling behind and that I'm. I'm losing this imaginary race
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  in my mind. This is really, really bad for
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  rest. You know, often to rest you have
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  to be unproductive. And so it's this horrible cycle
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  where I try to rest because I'm burnt out, and then I get
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  stressed about being unproductive, and then I get
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  burnt out from that stress. And it's just this wicked wicked
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  cycle. So you have to actively try to
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  be unproductive whenever you're resting and allow yourself to
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  simply exist. You do not need to be productive
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  in order to be valid as a human. You do not need to constantly be
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  in motion in order to be improving.
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  It is okay to pause. It's okay to be stagnant.
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  Improvement is not a linear process.
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  You don't always have to be moving up.
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  You don't always have to be making leaps and bounds.
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  Sometimes simply existing is enough.
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  Sometimes simply being present with yourself in your mind is
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  enough, and that is an incredibly important skill to
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  learn. You need to allow yourself to be
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  unproductive. It is unfair and unreasonable to
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  expect yourself to be productive 24/7, allow yourself to do
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  nothing and exist within that moment.
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  Next U is connection to art and nature.
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  I think this is really, really, really important.
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  I think that both art and nature ignite something within us, some
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  feeling of calm and peace that is absolutely crucial to rest.
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  Personally, I connect to art the most.
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  I sit down and I make music and that is this meditative state.
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  For me, it is the absolute best rest that I could ask for.
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  Being in nature is also extremely meditative and
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  restful. It allows you to exist in a
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  place where everything is exactly how it needs to be, that
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  the birds are chirping and the wind is blowing and you can
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  simply be at peace and exist within that place.
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  I believe art and nature are very, very important to be able
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  to find rest and to be able to find your happy place.
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  So many people find happiness within art and nature, and to be
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  able to engage in that and rest within it will improve your
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  mental and emotional stability greatly.
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  It's helped me so much. I try to make time every single
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  day to exist in a state of either creating art or being in
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  nature. And it doesn't have to be
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  anything crazy. Sometimes it's just playing the
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  piano for 10 minutes or sitting in my backyard and just feeling
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  the sun, But it's really, really important in order to allow
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  yourself to rest. Last up on this list of nine
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  types of rest is stillness to decompress.
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  Decompression is incredibly important for mental rest.
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  I don't know about you, but I hold my stress physically.
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  I hold my anxiety physically, so I have a little routine that I
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  go through in order to allow myself to decompress.
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  So often I get home and I'll like, take a shower because
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  being clean is really, really important to me.
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  And then I'll allow myself to decompress from all of the
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  anxieties I may have been holding from the day.
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  I allow my eyebrows to relax. I take my tongue off of the roof
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  of my mouth. I let my jaw relax, I push my
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  shoulders down, and then I take a deep, deep breath.
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  Allowing yourself to decompress physically helps your mental
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  state immensely. Many of us hold our stresses or
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  our emotional turmoil physically, so being able to
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  decompress from that can help so, so much in resting and
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  allowing ourselves peace and space.
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  I really just can't emphasize enough how important rest is for
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  our mental Wellness. It is, I think, one of the
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  number one most important things.
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  Allowing yourself to be unproductive, allowing yourself
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  to not be helpful, connecting to art and nature, and giving
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  yourself the stillness to decompress are just some of the
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  ways that you can rest and you can allow yourself space to
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  recover and grow mentally. I highly, highly recommend that
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  you check out the list of all nine types of rest by Steph
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  Baron Hall, as it is just an absolute goldmine of ways that
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  you can relax in ways that you can improve your mental piece
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  that's going to wrap it up for today's episode.
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  Thank you so much for tuning in and understanding that you
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  deserve rest. If you need help feeling your
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  feelings, please check out my music on all platforms under the
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  name of Ethan Jewel. I almost guarantee it'll make
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  you cry. Also, shoot me a message on my
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  Instagram at Jewel Boy under score and let me know what you
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  thought about today's episode. Thank you so much for listening.
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  And as always, thank you for feeling your feelings.
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  I'll see you next time.