There was a time when I couldn’t lie in bed on a Saturday without hearing the imaginary voice of a judgmental life coach in my head, whispering,

You’re wasting time. You could be cleaning, building, achieving. Doing something.”

Even on weekends, rest came with terms and conditions, “only if you’ve earned it,” “only if it’s an active recovery,” and “only if it doesn’t look like laziness.” I didn’t relax, I scheduled restorative activities. Even My Google Calendar had more color blocks than a pride parade, and still I felt behind.

I thought if I just kept going, kept optimizing, kept checking off invisible boxes, eventually I’d arrive at this utopia of productivity where anxiety didn’t exist and self-worth came gift-wrapped in to-do lists.

I was lying to myself. I don’t save lives. I won’t launch a new startup next week. Then what am I doing and thinking all this time?!

One Saturday morning not long ago, I chose to do absolutely nothing.

No agenda. No inbox-checking. Just me, a messy bed, and the soft rebellion of stillness. And would you believe someone in the room actually said, “I need to change your life.”

Excuse me, can you repeat again?

That was the moment I realized how deeply we’ve all been indoctrinated by this illusion of productivity. This collective addiction of doing, performing, achieving… even when our bodies are screaming for stillness.

And here’s my confession tea: I’m already on progress to change my life. I had finally built rhythm in my weekdays, softened the way I worked, introduced routines that served my anxiety instead of spiking it. But the moment I reclaimed a Saturday for myself, someone else still can actually project their unease onto me because they didn’t know how to sit still.

This moment of unsolicited motivation and coaching session isn’t just annoying, it’s also revealing something about someone.

People aren’t always reacting to you. Sometimes, they might be reacting to the fact that you’re doing what they can’t.

That you’re calm. That you’re choosing ease. That you’re no longer enslaved by the myth that busyness and being overwhelmed equal worth. And a sad truth of that story? That used to be me. I wasn’t resting. I was recovering from my compulsion to prove.

It’s taken me months, maybe years, to peel back the illusion of productivity. To realize that if I don’t stop, I’ll burn out. And that no version of my best life includes being mentally shattered but professionally praised.

In case no one’s told you yet, productivity is not a personality. Neither is burnout. We live in a society where people wear dark under-eye circles like medals of honor and treat “I only slept three hours” as a humblebrag. God forbid you sleep in, enjoy your coffee slowly, or take a deep breath without monetizing it.

Taking a rest day? That’s social suicide, according to the LinkedIn-ified overlords of hustle culture.

Rest isn’t laziness, it’s biology.

According to Mayo Clinic Health System, downtime helps reduce stress, boosts creativity, and improves focus. And in a study cited by Time Magazine, researchers found that rest enhances learning and problem-solving skills. Which is shocking, right? Who would’ve guessed that sleeping and not spiraling might actually help you be… better?

Now don’t get it twisted. Rest days aren’t about becoming a couch potato with a PhD in Netflix. No shade to that, though. They’re about intentionality.

I prefer to call this rest days, happening on weekend, as mindful productivity. It’s the moment when you consciously choose rhythm over chaos, focus over frenzy, and sanity over that voice in your head screaming “you should be doing something.”

You see, some of us figured out that rest is a rebellious, elegant middle finger to capitalism’s obsession with 24/7 output. It’s the kind of productivity that doesn’t come with a Red Bull IV drip or a calendar full of color-coded mental breakdowns.

And oh boy it works.

I don’t want to sound like I’m giving you guys an HR-driven wellness seminar, but let’s talk a little about why rest can make you an actual genius.

Physchology Today confirms that reflective downtime helps you improve performance, not kill it. When I found this, it’s kind of wild to read the idea of boosting your productivity and performance is actually to do the opposite. I bet you guys are as surprised as me. Then, we probably lose our guilt by now. Get a rest. Get some sleep. Or not.

Deep inside of us still think with the internalized hustle culture that we’ve build since forever. It’s normal, as normal as finding it hard to change it.

You could be wrapped in a blanket of lavender tea and lo-fi beats and still feel that itchy guilt creeping in like, “Am I wasting my life?”

My bros and babes, that’s not intuition. That’s THE internalized hustle culture I’m talking about. We’ve been gaslit into thinking rest is a luxury, not a need. You grew up watching people glorify stress, not regulate it. If you weren’t exhausted, were you even trying?

And if someone tries to say, “But you’re just not ambitious enough,” remind them that burnout doesn’t look good on anyone, darling. Not even if you pair it with Celine or Chanel.

So here’s the moral of the story: you don’t need to earn your rest, time or day. You’re not a phone that only gets to recharge when your screen time says so. You are a living, breathing, sensitive, intelligent being who runs on rhythm, not race.

My bros and babes, your rest days aren’t lazy, they’re legendary. They’re what make your grind sustainable, your goals achievable, and your mind livable.

So next Saturday, when you feel the pressure to “be productive” when you’re having your legendary resting time, just remember: you are doing it now as we speak. You’re regenerating your brilliance.

Lay down. Breathe deep. And don’t feel guilty for one second.

Have a nice weekend everyone!