Why do I feel guilty when I rest?

Growing up, I was surrounded by women who I thought were superheroes.

My grandmother was always the first one awake. Before the sun had properly risen, she' was already in the garden, swept the front step, baked some scones for breakfast and somehow managed to have lunch simmering on the stove before most people had even started their day. My mom wasn't much different. She was a single parent since I was 9 and when she wasn’t at her full time job there always seemed to be something that needed doing. Washing hanging on the line. Dinner cooking. Floors being mopped. Someone who needed a lift. Someone who needed comforting. Someone who needed her.

I don't remember them ever saying they were tired.

Perhaps they were.

Perhaps they simply didn't think they were allowed to be.

As a little girl, I watched them with complete admiration. They were the women everyone depended on. They carried families through difficult seasons, stretched money when there wasn't enough of it, put food on the table and somehow still managed to make home feel safe. If strength had a face, it looked like them.

I wanted to grow up to be exactly like them.

The funny thing about childhood is that no one has to teach you the rules. You collect them quietly, simply by paying attention.

No one ever sat me down and said, "Your worth will be measured by how much you do."

No one ever said, "A good woman puts everyone else first."

No one ever said, "Rest is something you earn."

But somehow, those lessons found me anyway.

They slipped into my life so gently that I didn't even know they were there.

Years later, I caught myself doing exactly what I'd watched the women before me do.

I was always busy.

Always productive.

Always trying to make everyone else's life a little easier.

If there was a spare hour in my day, I'd find something useful to fill it. Sitting still felt... uncomfortable. Almost selfish. Even with a cup of coffee in my hands, my mind was already halfway through tomorrow's to-do list.

It never occurred to me that I wasn't choosing this way of living.

I was simply repeating it.

Then my body did something I never would have chosen for myself at the very young age of 28.

It stopped. Completely.

For the first time in my life, there was nowhere to run. No project to throw myself into. No amount of working harder that could fix what had finally broken inside me.

I remember sitting outside one morning with a coffee, looking at absolutely nothing in particular, and feeling restless. There was nowhere I needed to be, yet every part of me felt guilty for sitting there.

I actually laughed at myself.

Here I was, exhausted beyond words, and I still couldn't convince myself that I was allowed to rest.

That was the moment the question came to me.

Who told us we had to earn it?

Because when I looked around, nature certainly wasn't operating that way.

The trees weren't trying to prove anything.

The river wasn't apologising for slowing as it curved around the rocks.

Even the lions I'd spent hours watching in Africa understood something I'd somehow forgotten. They rested without guilt. They weren't worried about whether they'd been productive enough that morning to deserve an afternoon lying beneath a tree.

Only humans seem to believe that stillness has to be justified.

Sometimes I wonder what my grandmother would have done if someone had taken the broom from her hands and told her to sit down for an hour. I wonder if she would have smiled... or if she would have felt exactly the same discomfort I did with that cup of coffee in my hands.

The older I get, the more I realise those remarkable women gave me so much.

They taught me resilience.

Loyalty.

Commitment.

Love.

But perhaps my generation has an opportunity to add something to that legacy.

Perhaps we can teach the daughters and granddaughters watching us that strength isn't only found in how much we carry.

Perhaps it's also found in knowing when to put something down.

Maybe the greatest gift we can pass on isn't another lesson in sacrifice.

Maybe it's showing them that a woman doesn't have to earn her right to rest.

She simply has to remember that she always had it.

If this story resonated with you, perhaps it's because a part of you is quietly asking for permission to stop.

Not for an hour.

Not for a weekend.

But long enough to remember who you are without the constant pressure to keep going.

The Shift Safari Retreat wasn't created as another holiday. It was created for women who have spent so much of their lives looking after everyone else that they've forgotten what it feels like to simply breathe, to laugh, to feel present and to come home to themselves.

If you're wondering what that could look like, I'd love to share more with you.

Download The Shift Safari Retreat Brochure and take a look at what's waiting for you in the heart of the African bush. Sometimes, the first step isn't booking a retreat. It's simply allowing yourself to imagine that you're worthy of one.

→ Download Your Complimentary Retreat Brochure

With love,

Alka xxx