You’re Tired! You Need A Sabbath

A moth danced around the reading lamp, casting shadows across the keyboard. I squinted at the clock: 11:47pm. Feeling a rush of panic, my fingernails tapped the plastic keys a little faster. Working so late into the night, it probably goes without saying: I was tired. Not the good kind where you want to snuggle up in bed—the kind where your adrenaline-fuelled body doesn’t want to cooperate. I’d been sitting in this position for nearly three days. My back ached. My desk was cluttered with old mugs, scrap paper and random objects that frazzled me and filled me with shame. I needed a shower.

A word to the wise: don’t say yes to 15 projects at once. It might sound obvious but when you’re self-employed, this is often easier said than done. Just two months prior, I’d been projectless and ready to give up on freelancing completely. Now, I was drowning in work. I could blame the rising cost of living, poor business management or even call it an “inherent part of being a freelancer” . . . but they’re all surface issues. In reality, this unsustainable pace was the fruit of a much deeper heart problem.

an unsustainable pace

In his short and famous essay published in 1930, economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that within 100 years, most people would work no more than 15 hours per week, and that working would be optional. Today, in a world where 60 per cent of us are connected to work via smartphone for 13 or more hours per day, we laugh at Keynes’ predictions. A recent Harvard Business School survey of 1000 professionals found that 94 per cent worked at least 50 hours per week, while half worked more than 65 hours. Unsurprisingly, the percentage of Americans reporting that they “never have enough time” rose from 70 per cent in 2011 to 80 per cent in 2018.

Closer to home, Australians are working 3.2 billion hours of unpaid overtime a year¹ and have 200 million days of accrued annual leave, while 3.8 million go without lunch breaks daily. We are overworked, overscheduled and increasingly time poor. But it’s not just our calendars that are full to overflowing—it’s also our homes. Global statistics show that if every person on earth lived like the average American, we would need 5.2 planets to support us. In Australia, McCrindle Research has found that 80 per cent of us consume more than we need, while 60 per cent believe our nation’s consumption habits are having a negative impact. Today, the average Australian pays $A163 a month on self-storage—bolstering a $US40b industry—even though 25 per cent of us can’t even remember what we’re storing. These consumption habits are only being made worse by digital marketing, with the average person in the West seeing between 4000 and 10,000 advertisements per day. Combining this hyper-consumerism with chronic over-scheduling creates a toxic combination of stress, burnout, overwhelm and dissatisfaction. The question is: Why are we like this?

the glorification of busyness

As sociologist Jonathan Gershuny notes, “Work, not leisure, is now the signifier of dominant social status.” Philosopher Byung-Chul Han attributes our busyness problem to what he calls “achievement society”. He argues our modern world has become so obsessed with achievement, performance and self-optimisation that they have now become “ends in themselves”.² This may be why people who appear to exert high effort or use productivity tools are considered “morally admirable”, regardless of their actual output. Contemporary neuroscience confirms that achieving major goals—even winning the lottery—doesn’t cause long-term happiness. Rather, it is the act of seeking, regardless of outcome, that drives human behaviour. Being busy and accumulating material things are major signs that we’re on this “quest”, and a subconscious way of proving our value to others. As Christian finance guru Dave Ramsey famously said, “We buy things we don’t need, with money we don’t have, to impress people we don’t like.”³ We rent storage units because our homes are overflowing. We tap screens to order food we don’t have the time to cook. We drag our bodies through early morning traffic to meet deadlines we should never have agreed to in the first place. 

While a Buddhist may try to kill desire to end suffering, a consumerist may continue to feed it for the same reason. Meanwhile, Christian teacher John Mark Comer argues that our suffering is caused by the fact that humans have an inner, infinite desire that cannot be fulfilled by finite, earthly things. The fourth-century theologian Augustine of Hippo famously said, “Our heart is restless until it rests in you [God].”⁴ We were created for an eternal life with God—and so, our natural tendency is to fill our lives and schedules in the hopes of satisfying our inherent restlessness. 

Surely there’s a better way. 

a restless heart

In his book Subversive Sabbath, AJ Swoboda argues that despite living in a 24/7 culture of convenience, we are “ominously dissatisfied”. 

“In bowing at these sacred altars of hyperactivity, progress and technological compulsivity, our souls increasingly pant for meaning and value and truth as they wither away, exhausted, frazzled, displeased, ever on edge . . . Our bodies wear ragged. Our spirits thirst. We have an inability to simply sit still and be. As we drown ourselves in 24/7 living, we seem to be able to do anything but quench our true thirst for the life of God. We have failed to ask ourselves the question Jesus asks of us: ‘What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?’ (Matthew 16:26). We must begin by remembering.”⁵

There is one simple practice that God has asked us to remember. It can unravel our busy schedules, undo our overconsumption, and restore peace and harmony to our lives, and to the world at large. Maybe it sounds too good to be true, but in those 11:47pm moments, when my cortisol is at an all-time high and I’m ready to have a “menty-b”, this practice keeps me grounded. I know that even though I’m momentarily unbalanced, that soon, I’ll get to experience true rest—deep, meaningful rest. It’s called Sabbath.

rest for the soul

Put simply, Sabbath is a 24-hour period from sunset on Friday to sunset on Saturday. It was designed to help us engage in deep, restorative rest. God did not design us to be harried and stressed all the time. On Sabbath, we stop worrying, wanting, working. We step away from the emails and spreadsheets and begin to feel human again. How you choose to spend this time is up to you but some basic tenets include: spending time with loved ones, eating good food, laughing (a lot, if possible), spending time in nature, seeing new places, making music, reading a good book and most importantly, being in God’s presence. 

Sabbath is a way of re-centring ourselves and remembering what is truly important (rather than just urgent) in life. Sabbath teaches us that we are human beings, not human “doings”. We refrain from buying things that clutter our lives and embrace the fact that our value is derived not from our accomplishments, our busyness or the things we own, but from our existence as children of God. There are increasing numbers of Christians—and even non-Christians—who are beginning to adopt this practice. Seventh-day Adventists have been doing it for nearly 200 years (every seventh day) and I’m grateful to have been brought up in a religious tradition that values this practice. But whether you’re Adventist or not, you can benefit from Sabbath rest. 

two encouragements

To the Christian exhausted by their heavy load, remember: Jesus is not glorified by unhappy, exhausted people. Rest is essential for emotional and spiritual health, and for loving others well. Rest isn’t just a suggestion, it’s a command from God—the fourth commandment urges God’s people to remember a weekly Sabbath as God did during Creation week. Sabbath observance doesn’t have to be a chore; it is an opportunity to prioritise physical rest in the middle of hustle and stress.  

And to the non-Christian who simply needs a break, remember: real luxury in life is not status, busyness or material things; it’s being able to read a book at an unhurried pace, in the middle of the day. Sabbath rest can do that. A weekly sabbath might be a good thing to practise for anyone who is “heavy laden”.

As Jesus says in Matthew 11:28-30 (MSG paraphrase):

“Are you tired? Worn out? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” 

This is the way of Jesus. 

This is Sabbath.

Maryellen Hacko is an artist and illustrator living in Sydney, Australia. 

1. Fiona McDonald, “Short changed: unsatisfactory working hours and unpaid overtime” (The Australia Institute, November 2023).

2. Byung-Chul Han, The Burnout Society. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2015.

3. Dave Ramsey, The Total Money Makeover Workbook: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness. Nashville, TN: Nelson Books, 2018.

4. Augustine of Hippo, translated by Peter Constantine, Confessions. New York, NY: WW Norton & Company, 2020.

5. A J Swoboda, Subversive Sabbath. Ada, MI: Baker Books, 2018.