When Rest Feels Harder Than Work

There was a season when even my faith felt like pressure.

I wasn't running from God—but I was running on empty. And in the quiet moments, when I reached for Him… it felt like work.

They say "just abide." But no one tells you how to do that when you're hanging on by a thread.

For years, I thought abiding was a spiritual discipline I had to practice or even, perfect. That if I could just believe hard enough, pray right enough, feel connected enough… I'd finally find peace.

But Andrew Murray gives us a different picture:

"Does it weary the traveler to rest in the house or on the bed where he seeks repose from his fatigue? Or is it a labor to a little child to rest in its mother's arms?"

And yet—that's exactly what I was doing. Spending effort to lie down. Trying to rest.

It sounds absurd, but maybe you know the feeling.

When Rest Becomes Another Item on Your List

When your nervous system is maxed out, even surrender can feel like a task. You try to quiet your soul… and end up more agitated. You "lean in" to Jesus… and wonder why it feels like strain.

This isn't rebellion. It's misdirected effort—trying so hard to let go that you paradoxically keep yourself from actually letting go.

Your body doesn't know the difference between effort toward productivity and effort toward rest. To a dysregulated nervous system, trying is trying. And trying keeps you wired.

The Shift That Changes Everything

That's the moment I realized: Abiding isn't something I achieve. It's something I allow.

It's not passivity—it's trust. It's letting go of the pressure to feel close, or do it right. It's faith that He's holding you… even when you don't feel held.

When you've been performing your way through life—including your spiritual life—this feels revolutionary. And terrifying.

What if you stopped trying to manufacture peace and instead trusted that it's already yours?

What if rest isn't about doing anything at all, but about believing you're safe enough to stop?

A Different Kind of Surrender

The truth is, I'm still learning this. I still catch myself trying to rest, working to abide, efforting my way toward ease.

But here's what reading "Abide in Christ" showed me: abiding is almost the opposite of trying. It's counterintuitive. It's paradoxical. Murray describes rest as something a traveler doesn't work for—you simply sink into the bed. A child doesn't strain to be held—they collapse into their mother's arms.

Yet everything in me wants to do something. The voice kicks in: "I MUST do SOMETHING!" Because doing nothing doesn't make sense to an achieving mind.

Maybe it's fear of boredom. Maybe fear of the unknown. Maybe it's that "if I'm not moving I'm dying" mentality that's been hardwired into us.

But I think what we're really afraid of—what keeps us performing even in prayer—is that nothing will happen. God won't show up. We won't feel peace. We won't get rest.

So we keep doing. We keep trying. We keep working at the very thing that requires us to stop working.

The Paradox That Sets You Free

Here's what I'm slowly learning: The fear that "nothing will happen" if we stop trying is exactly what keeps us from experiencing what's already ours. We block the very thing we're desperately seeking through our effort to obtain it.

Peace isn't something we produce through spiritual discipline—it's something we uncover when we stop blocking it with our striving. Rest isn't a reward we earn through perfect performance, but a gift we receive when we finally believe we're safe enough to collapse into it. And God doesn't show up because we've prayed with the right words or believed with enough intensity. He's already there, patiently waiting for us to stop long enough to notice His presence.

Your nervous system needs permission to stop performing—even in prayer, even in faith, even in rest. What would it look like to trust that you're held, whether you feel it or not?

This week, I wonder what it would look like if you trusted that being held doesn't require you to feel it. That the thing you're most afraid of—nothing happening when you stop performing—might actually be the doorway to everything you've been seeking. Trust can exist even when the feelings aren't there yet.

If something in you just said 'yes' to this, hold onto that. You don't need to muster more belief. You're not failing faith. You're just learning to be held.

Fellow Recovering Perfectionist,

Laura