Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto

by Tricia Hersey

Your body is a site of liberation. It doesn’t belong to capitalism. Love your body. Rest your body. Move your body. Hold your body.

Resting was my attempt to solve a problem in my life and like most Black women before me, I worked within the realms of my own life and history to create a way.

This book is a testimony and testament of my refusal to donate my body to a system that still owes a debt to my Ancestors for the theft of their labor and DreamSpace. I refuse to push my body to the brink of exhaustion and destruction. Let the chips fall where they may. I trust myself more than capitalism.

Survival is not the end goal for liberation. We must thrive. We must rest.

“Every shut eye ain’t sleep. I am resting my eyes and listening for what God wants to tell me.”

Rest is a healing portal to our deepest selves. Rest is care. Rest is radical.

Rest is radical because it disrupts the lie that we are not doing enough. It shouts: “No, that is a lie. I am enough. I am worthy now and always because I am here.”

I wish you rest today. I wish you a deep knowing that exhaustion is not a normal way of living. You are enough. You can rest. You must resist anything that doesn’t center your divinity as a human being. You are worthy of care.

To be colonized is to accept and buy into the lie of our worth being connected to how much we get done.

You are worthy of rest. We don’t have to earn rest. Rest is not a luxury, a privilege, or a bonus we must wait for once we are burned out.

“When and where can I find a moment of rest?”

Resting can look like: Closing your eyes for ten minutes. A longer shower in silence. Meditating on the couch for twenty minutes. Daydreaming by staring out of a window. Sipping warm tea before bed in the dark. Slow dancing with yourself to slow music. Experiencing a Sound Bath or other sound healing. A Sun Salutation. A twenty-minute timed nap. Praying. Crafting a small altar for your home. A long, warm bath. Taking regular breaks from social media. Not immediately responding to texts and emails. Deep listening to a full music album. A meditative walk in nature. Knitting, crocheting, sewing, and quilting. Playing a musical instrument. Deep eye contact. Laughing intensely.

It would be smart for us to not Turn our backs on rest and care We cannot afford to be exhausted and disconnected! We do the work for them when we Are afraid of our own power.

Barter and participate in mutual aid, make community care your biggest goal, learn to grow your own food, or support a Black or Indigenous farmer who does, build with an herbalist and other root workers.