Reclining Garden Chair
I discovered I had something like CFS/ME when my doctor, looking at his computer, muttered something about a fatigue clinic. I had been unwell and had had many blood tests, and was convinced when I arrived at the doctor’s surgery that day that I would be leaving with a prescription to address iron deficiency anemia which runs in my family. I was already familiar with CFS/ME due to a close family member having had the condition, so on hearing the phrase ‘chronic fatigue’ straight away I understood several things. Firstly that my recovery was going to take much longer than I had thought. Secondly that I would almost certainly live a full life again, but it would probably look different. It was good news and bad news – not a life-threatening acute illness but a chronic one with no easy solution. I knew I would require a great deal of good quality rest.
And so it was that my first practical action after speaking wth my husband and my colleagues about my new situation was to order a piece of garden furniture. Within a few days of the doctor’s appointment I was relaxing in the garden in a new reclining chair. In one interpretation this was revealing of my continued temptation to Consumerism – the belief that the right purchase will solve my problems. In itself this can be an additction that leads away from true life. By another interpretion, however, buying this chair was a statement of intent about my recovery – the first thing I needed was rest, and I knew a good chair in my sunny garden would help me with that. And so it has proved. I have sat in this chair every day (along with my cat) in snow, rain and sunshine. I am sitting in it now. My feet are raised, relieving my heart of some its work, my head is tilted back facing the sky and the sun and the clouds, the air is fresh and I can hear the wind in the leaves of our overgrown bamboo.
The idea of rest for the living can be tricky in the church. George Herbert’s poem ‘The Pulley’ describes God deliberately witholding from humanity the gift of rest, to ensure that we do not settle for anything less than God. Unsurprisingly I did not particularly enjoy hearing this poem on Sunday worship on the radio a short time into my illness. I agree spiritual restlessness is a key part of our journeys: ‘Our hearts are restless till they find their rest in thee', and my own spiritual restlessness has led me to take risks and make changes that I value. Herbert’s poem however seems to conflate spiritual rest with physical rest, and implies that rest inevitably leads away from attending to God. He was not one who seemed personally inclined for a rest – he died a relatively young man just three years into a busy ministry. There also can be a temptation to see rest and activity as a zero sum game. Doesn’t rest take away from doing things for God? My experience is that I have found God through rest. Rather than taking away from what we might do for God, rest in God is what will feed and resource and direct our activity. And we should not mistake collapsing from exhaustion with true rest. The most important stage in my recovery had been ‘finding my rest’, which means finding how much rest I need in order to feel well, and work from there. It is only from that position that I will be able to give my best. It is only when I am physically rested that I can perceive my spiritual restlessness, and let that take me to God.
(Written May 2022)
And so it was that my first practical action after speaking wth my husband and my colleagues about my new situation was to order a piece of garden furniture. Within a few days of the doctor’s appointment I was relaxing in the garden in a new reclining chair. In one interpretation this was revealing of my continued temptation to Consumerism – the belief that the right purchase will solve my problems. In itself this can be an additction that leads away from true life. By another interpretion, however, buying this chair was a statement of intent about my recovery – the first thing I needed was rest, and I knew a good chair in my sunny garden would help me with that. And so it has proved. I have sat in this chair every day (along with my cat) in snow, rain and sunshine. I am sitting in it now. My feet are raised, relieving my heart of some its work, my head is tilted back facing the sky and the sun and the clouds, the air is fresh and I can hear the wind in the leaves of our overgrown bamboo.
The idea of rest for the living can be tricky in the church. George Herbert’s poem ‘The Pulley’ describes God deliberately witholding from humanity the gift of rest, to ensure that we do not settle for anything less than God. Unsurprisingly I did not particularly enjoy hearing this poem on Sunday worship on the radio a short time into my illness. I agree spiritual restlessness is a key part of our journeys: ‘Our hearts are restless till they find their rest in thee', and my own spiritual restlessness has led me to take risks and make changes that I value. Herbert’s poem however seems to conflate spiritual rest with physical rest, and implies that rest inevitably leads away from attending to God. He was not one who seemed personally inclined for a rest – he died a relatively young man just three years into a busy ministry. There also can be a temptation to see rest and activity as a zero sum game. Doesn’t rest take away from doing things for God? My experience is that I have found God through rest. Rather than taking away from what we might do for God, rest in God is what will feed and resource and direct our activity. And we should not mistake collapsing from exhaustion with true rest. The most important stage in my recovery had been ‘finding my rest’, which means finding how much rest I need in order to feel well, and work from there. It is only from that position that I will be able to give my best. It is only when I am physically rested that I can perceive my spiritual restlessness, and let that take me to God.
(Written May 2022)
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