You are invited to rest, dear friends. The month of January brings IV of Swords and with this card pull an invitation for healing through rest. 

The holidays can be lovely and also very taxing on our physical bodies and mental health. Add on kin keeping to all the daily and pre-holiday activities and you won’t have much energy left. What is kin keeping you may wonder? It is a form of emotional labor most often performed by women in maintaining and strengthening familial ties. Oh, you know, it’s all the holiday coordinating, meal planning, the birthdays you remember, the gifts you select to buy, and all the invisible tasks that are handled by you and yet rarely seen or even acknowledged that they are a thing.

So yes, you are most definitely in need of rest. Perhaps this month's rest looks like allowing yourself to enjoy a nap. Love binge watching a show in your pajamas? Need a break from screens? Pick your medicine and give your body and mind a break. 

Allowing rest also means you may have to let go of the expectations you and others have of you. Here at Bonds we always encourage turtle steps. This is what a turtle step of letting go and allowing yourself to rest may look like:

• You feel the pressure to organize your pantry after the holidays but instead you choose to take a luxurious bath

• You feel the need to go food shopping early in the morning but instead you allow yourself to sleep in

• You have unanswered texts or emails but instead of responding you make yourself a hot cup or tea, coffee, or cocoa and you watch the clouds gently dance in the sky

You get the gist. Resting doesn’t mean you leave your family for the weekend and go off to a spa for two days…although, if you can pull that off, you will be our shero! 

Resting means taking small actions that are acts of kindness towards yourself. Life is an endless series of tasks, there is no getting ahead of them and there will always be more to do. Without rest, your quality of life suffers. 

So honor your need or desire for rest, it’s nothing short of an act of self-love. 

Mantra for January: I honor my desire to rest and give myself permission to take a break.

Love,

Sylwia