Set the Tempo: The definitive power of rest in every season

I’ve been writing of late about how damaging habitual thinking can be, how important mind rest is.  And yes, this all sprang from a life-control DVR concept in an Adam Sandler flick, Click.

Today we’ll talk about how rest affects what you do when you’re not resting.  Eventually we’ll talk about the other steps to breaking thinking habits and renewal.  It’s okay to wait.

Why do we look at relaxation and rest like it’s a luxury, distraction, or a sign of laziness instead of what it really is:  A necessity to survive, essential to thrive.  The root of your drive.   Roses are red, violets are blue, I write prose and rhyme too!

The quality of rest actually defines our movement.  Think about it.  Not so long ago I developed a habit of scheduling recuperation time… After vacation.  Where my mind was at the time, I went so wild enjoying this so-called rest I was more tired after.

The quality of rest defines our movement.  If your rest is really exhaustion, a fleeting escape from reality, a hot second before you jump back on the treadmill… That’s how you’ll work: Worn-out, exhausted, purposeless, random, never-ending, never progressing.

Limited. Frustrated.  Ineffective.

The quality of rest defines our movement.  Rest defines rhythm in music.  Literally, a song has no beat, no structure, no progression unless there are hundreds if not thousands of momentary rests between notes.  Allyoudhaveisonelongneverendingnote.  And spaces between letters are what help us understand.  Darn hash tags.

Let’s dance a bit in music analogy-land. Remember we’re still talking about mental rest and how it helps us to change our thinking habits, renew us, and drive our actions toward success.

Music is written with attention not only to lyrics, notes and  rhythm, but also to tempo.

A beat, or pause, or rest in music is actually a relative idea.  It’s not like a second in time, which is relatively absolute.  Ha.

The actual length of time that passes with each beat, or pause, or rest in the song is defined by the tempo.  The beats and notes themselves are set by the composer defining the song, but without a set tempo, the performer could get real interpretive with the performance.

That’s why for example, you could sing Mary Had a Little Lamb fast or slow and still recognize the song.

Composers knew this and also made it clear what they expected the speed to be, by setting the tempo.

Technically speaking, tempo is the number of beats per minute.  Just like our heart rate.

So one beat in a song with a really fast tempo will go by very quickly.  One beat in that same song with a really slow tempo will drag out longer.

The tempo sets the quality of rest.  In music, it’s universally recognized that songs with a faster tempo, are harder to play and sing.  They also tend to have a lighter mood, and the sound of a major key which generally sounds happier.

You have to know what your tempo is, for every season of your life.

Classical composers didn’t write one 3- minute song at a time.  They were more like screenwriters, setting a story over an hours-long series of scenes, or songs, or seasons.  And each song within these longer, epic works had a different tempo.  Tempo is defined at the beginning of the work, and as needed after.  If there is no notation about tempo, it’s assumed to stay the same.

Rest in each tempo, or season is by definition, different from another.

If you know your mind controls your actions, and your mind is set to preferences you didn’t assign… And rest is the first step toward renewing your mind…

If rest is what brings structure and order to your life, and defines how well you work when you stop resting…

If rest is relative, with the length of time defined by you according to the tempo you’ve set for your life… And if your life is your most epic, dynamic, world-changing work ever …

Why would you live like rest is an annoying and distracting glitch on a recording of a bad pop interlude?

Recognize how big this is.  How definitively powerful rest is, to your action, movement and how free you are to define it.

Remember how non-negotiable it is for you to claim it.