The Nap Bishop Is Spreading the Good Word: Rest
October 25, 2022 12:13 PM Subscribe
Just the other week I decided to start seeing if an afternoon nap would give me a little extra pep. I'm not successfully dozing off, but even taking 15 minutes to lay quietly on my bed has helped. Also makes my two dogs super excited to come charge up on the bed and lay up on me.
posted by drewbage1847 at 12:43 PM on October 25, 2022 [13 favorites]
posted by drewbage1847 at 12:43 PM on October 25, 2022 [13 favorites]
One of the best things about WFH during covid was the opportunity to lay down for no more than 18 minutes during the afternoon and get some useful shut-eye. It really improves my mood and my day.
posted by suelac at 12:49 PM on October 25, 2022 [5 favorites]
posted by suelac at 12:49 PM on October 25, 2022 [5 favorites]
Can't wait to read the book.
I tried; it put me right to sleep.
;)
posted by Greg_Ace at 12:51 PM on October 25, 2022 [9 favorites]
I tried; it put me right to sleep.
;)
posted by Greg_Ace at 12:51 PM on October 25, 2022 [9 favorites]
is there a way we can connect this with (not) permanently defacing a famous work of art and gluing ourselves to something? Maybe nap while glued. Awake refreshed, apply solvent and destroy capitalism.
posted by philip-random at 1:36 PM on October 25, 2022
posted by philip-random at 1:36 PM on October 25, 2022
I don't nap because it fucks up my sleep (and makes me feel hungover when I wake up), but I build in regular rest breaks throughout the day. I do a specific routine of getting under some blankets and pillows, a few minutes of pain-relieving stretches, and then listening to a guided visualization/sleep story. The more I've done this regularly, the more quickly I've been able to get to that relaxed state and just rest. Used to need 30 minutes for it to do anything, now it takes about 10 before my nervous system enters the very pleasant "I no longer have bones" stage. Highly recommend it for people who don't like naps but need some rest.
posted by brook horse at 2:03 PM on October 25, 2022 [16 favorites]
posted by brook horse at 2:03 PM on October 25, 2022 [16 favorites]
from the second FPP link, to WBUR.org: Hersey says we need to give ourselves permission to rest. It’s why she set an automatic email response that states, “I’m prioritizing rest over responding.” [...] A basic foundation of Hersey’s work is her assertion that sleep deprivation is a social justice issue. For Black people specifically, sleep deprivation traces back to slavery and the long hours they were forced to work on plantations, Hersey says. That same “machine-level pace of labor” is what’s driving capitalism today.
“And so when I say that the idea of resisting a system that says you are a part of the cog in this wheel. Your body doesn't belong to you. It belongs to the clock,” she says. “So to resist that, to disrupt that and say that's not true. That's a lie. I'm divine. I can rest. Rest is my natural state. It is my birthright. To disrupt that and push back is the social justice piece of it.”
posted by Iris Gambol at 5:30 PM on October 25, 2022 [10 favorites]
“And so when I say that the idea of resisting a system that says you are a part of the cog in this wheel. Your body doesn't belong to you. It belongs to the clock,” she says. “So to resist that, to disrupt that and say that's not true. That's a lie. I'm divine. I can rest. Rest is my natural state. It is my birthright. To disrupt that and push back is the social justice piece of it.”
posted by Iris Gambol at 5:30 PM on October 25, 2022 [10 favorites]
Tricia Hersey's Instagram account has been such a phenomenal portal for the last few years. It's been a delight to see the rest of the world catching up to her message that she's been spreading for some time now.
I'm a devout leftist who has been a bit dismayed lately by how much internalized capitalism it turns out that I have despite my politics. I rarely nap, but I finally took one this weekend after feeling knocked out by my booster. I kept picturing, "What would the Nap Bishop tell me? She would tell me to lay my ass down." I'm so grateful for her work.
posted by mostly vowels at 6:18 PM on October 25, 2022 [9 favorites]
I'm a devout leftist who has been a bit dismayed lately by how much internalized capitalism it turns out that I have despite my politics. I rarely nap, but I finally took one this weekend after feeling knocked out by my booster. I kept picturing, "What would the Nap Bishop tell me? She would tell me to lay my ass down." I'm so grateful for her work.
posted by mostly vowels at 6:18 PM on October 25, 2022 [9 favorites]
I am so grateful for the work of The Nap Bishop and other Black women (Celeste Headlee, Dr. Sandra Daulton-Smith, adrienne maree brown) to reclaim rest and pleasure as liberation for everyone. Daulton-Smith's rest quiz has been super helpful to me as a resource for self-assessment and awareness.
posted by sockshaveholes at 6:58 AM on October 26, 2022 [6 favorites]
posted by sockshaveholes at 6:58 AM on October 26, 2022 [6 favorites]
Great post, thanks praemunire!
All of culture is in collaboration for us not to rest. There is no system in our culture that supports and makes space for us to rest. This culture does not want you rested unless it is attached to your increased labor and productivity. No one will give you rest. This is an outlier investigation. A counternarrative. It is trust work. It is healing work. It is decolonizing work. It is a subculture holding space for the blossoming of a resistance. An excerpt from Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia Hersey.
posted by Bella Donna at 8:22 AM on October 26, 2022 [3 favorites]
All of culture is in collaboration for us not to rest. There is no system in our culture that supports and makes space for us to rest. This culture does not want you rested unless it is attached to your increased labor and productivity. No one will give you rest. This is an outlier investigation. A counternarrative. It is trust work. It is healing work. It is decolonizing work. It is a subculture holding space for the blossoming of a resistance. An excerpt from Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia Hersey.
posted by Bella Donna at 8:22 AM on October 26, 2022 [3 favorites]
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