Few would have known it, but when I quit my full-time job as a journalist over seven years ago, I was driven by a peculiar, almost idealistic, quest for stability. This may seem like a paradoxical claim since gainful employment is typically regarded as the most reliable gateway to financial security.

In a fragile economic order, jobs are sacred, a blessing one can’t abandon so easily. Without work, it is difficult to imagine how anyone can put two square meals on the table. Yet, it was my job that was steadily depleting me, pushing me into a dark cave I’d never envisaged myself in.

The situation hadn’t always been so dire. Work had once been the panacea to my distress. A demanding, deadline-driven career as an editor was nothing short of a dream. Unlike most people, I had the distinct privilege of entering a profession that brought me closer to my passion. Since childhood, I was drawn to the magnetism of the written word. Scrawling poems and stories into diaries became my favoured pastime, a creative pursuit that entertained and challenged me in equal measure. Words weren’t just my plaything; they were the clay I moulded into different shapes to make sense of the world. Not many people can understand this affinity, especially in a South Asian milieu where creative writing isn’t perceived as a traditional career path.

Owing to the limited possibilities others imagined for my future, I found myself at a prestigious law school. At first, I succumbed to social pressure and wholeheartedly accepted that I was destined to join the legal profession. However, my passion for writing continued to beckon me each time I browsed through the pages of the heavy tomes I was expected to read as part of my course. I found a strange kinship with the printed words in those books; they solidified my belief that I would be nothing but a misfit as a lawyer in a black coat.

After completing my degree, I shifted my focus to journalism in the hope of reconnecting with those words. Instead of venturing into the perilous playground of news reporting, I casually slid into the ivory tower of an editorial desk. Mercifully, I wasn’t denied entry and soon found my second home at a newspaper office.

I derived an unusual thrill from the mundane tasks associated with my role as a subeditor. In retrospect, I wasn’t just a glorified housekeeper with a curious attention to grammar. Every day, I read through a slew of news stories with an attentive yet critical eye, polishing them until the prose sparkled with purpose. The expertise of a design team helped me watch those edited pieces take on a life of their own on dummy newspaper pages, which I proofread with a child-like devotion.

It was the career I had always imagined for myself, but no dream lasts forever. Have you ever noticed how dreams seem more vivid, bleak and threatening mere minutes before we are about to awaken? Something similar happened to me four years after I became a journalist, but my mind wasn’t yet aware of it. Instead, it was the rest of my body that began sounding the alarm bells and protesting on behalf of the mind.

The first symptoms arrived subtly, but were impossible to ignore. An unyielding stiffness settled into my neck, making it difficult for me to tilt or turn my head. A sharp, stabbing pain radiated through my shoulders, across my upper back and into the base of my skull. Soon afterwards, an uncomfortable distension rippled through my gut, accompanied by a racing heartbeat that was difficult to tame.

In March 2018, I made a frantic trip to the emergency room, convinced that I was a step closer to death. “It’s nothing life-threatening,” he told me. “You’ve got gastritis and a neck spasm. You’ll need to reduce your exposure to stress. It’s fairly common in your line of work.”

Knowing the enemy doesn’t bring us any closer to defeating it. For the next eleven months, I learnt to live with those nerve-racking symptoms while continuing to revel in my work.

At the same time, I found myself reflecting on the subliminal messages my body was trying to convey to me through these ailments. After a prolonged period of introspection, I realised that in the restless pursuit of career milestones, I had allowed my ambition to eclipse my body’s needs. My body was exhausted, but this wasn’t the kind of fatigue that can be overcome by a power nap or a good night’s rest. Rest, it soon dawned on me, wasn’t about sleep. Instead, it is rooted in other activities and stimuli.

In her insightful book Sacred Rest: Recover Your Life, Renew Your Energy, Restore Your Sanity, internal medicine physician Saundra Dalton Smith examines how people can experience seven different types of exhaustion.

Each form of fatigue requires a different remedy. Physical exhaustion, which falls neatly within the conventional definition of tiredness, can be alleviated through sleep or relaxation. Mental fatigue stems from cognitive overload and is best addressed by temporarily detaching ourselves from the source of our distress. Emotional exhaustion often arises from incessant people-pleasing, which compels many of us to disregard our personal boundaries and stifle our true feelings.

Sensory fatigue is a consequence of excessive exposure to noise, bright lights and digital screens, resulting in overstimulation that can only be eased by reducing such stimuli. Spiritual exhaustion can be countered through prayer, meditation or reflection, which can help us discover meaning in the seemingly mundane. Social fatigue arises when we are surrounded by toxic relationships and must limit contact with those who drain our emotional energy. Creative fatigue is a reminder that our minds need to renew themselves through art, music or pursuits that restore inspiration or awaken our sense of wonder.

I didn’t know any of this in such vivid detail, for such insights weren’t ingrained in the hearts and minds of us ‘nineties kids’. All I knew was that my mind needed to rest. Curiously enough, I wasn’t sleep-deprived; I simply craved a different kind of restoration. I couldn’t find a remedy for my malaise without first understanding its source. I don’t believe in senseless blame-games, but soon discovered that the path to healing begins with identifying the adversary. After much reflection, I concluded that my millennial work ethic was partly to blame for my afflictions.

At first, this seemed like an odd conclusion since I had explicitly refused to identify as a millennial and, thereby, rejected simplistic stereotypes based on age. Yet, I couldn’t deny the pernicious influence of the millennial values that had quietly seeped into my consciousness. Like most millennials, I, too, had internalised the belief that hard work opens the portal to stability.

I had pursued the conventional markers of success, convinced that they would steer me towards a kind of professional nirvana. I never hesitated to work long hours. Even now, I recall – with a heady mix of pride and disbelief, not regret – working 40 days without taking a single day off. Those were the days when I thought unwavering dedication to one’s craft could erase all obstacles. The desire to become a proverbial ‘jack of all trades’ seemed attainable, even if it meant I had to compromise on free time to improve upon my skill set.

Fuelled by an almost naive perception of my invincibility, I came to regard rest as a luxury rather than a necessity. In a world driven by the ‘hustle culture’, the desire to pause and reflect felt like a weakness, one that would attract harsh scrutiny and compel the world to perceive me as lazy or without ambition. I dreaded the implications associated with these labels. These impressions weren’t just fleeting judgments; they could easily morph into the defining markers of one’s identity.

All these cherished notions seemed deeply flawed after my minor health scare. It gradually dawned on me that, as I robotically fulfilled my duties as a productive worker, I had stopped seeing myself as a human being. My body was operating like a machine, carrying out one task after another at a relentless pace. Yet, even heavy machinery cannot function continuously; it, too, needs a momentary reprieve. I was holding myself to an unrealistic standard of productivity, not out of an earnest desire to earn praise from my supervisors but because I was consumed by the fear of being left behind.

Once I realised that my relationship with work had to change, I struggled to make all the necessary adjustments to my lifestyle. Unlearning old habits requires us to accept that past patterns aren’t healthy. I recognised my mistakes, but couldn’t summon the strength to admit them to anyone. Publicising our failures often presents us in an unfavourable light. Not only do we fall in other people’s estimation, but we also fall on our own. Ashamed of my own inadequacies, I didn’t want my vulnerabilities to be exposed before those who might silently judge me for being overly sensitive.

Not everyone would understand that my body’s desire for rest was possibly connected to the occupational hazards of working in the media, where journalists are the first to process traumatic events, sometimes even before the public hears about them. It can take years to grow accustomed to the rawness and brutality of tragic news stories. My senior colleagues weren’t apathetic; they had simply mastered the art of detaching themselves from the chaos of our profession.

Fortunately, these internal struggles weren’t impeding the quality of my work, so I felt no compulsion to discuss them with anyone. Yet, they were ubiquitous, holding me in a tight embrace and threatening to assail me.

Hoping that time would transform me into a battle-hardened journalist I was expected to become, I continued with the rhythm of my professional life and occasionally sought comfort in convenient distractions. I read novels and wrote short reviews about them on Instagram. This strategy helped me find solace in fictional landscapes and reaffirm my abiding love for literature. Yet, it felt like an escapist fantasy and confirmed my belief that the story of my life had to be rewritten.

At the same time, I binge-watched Netflix series, hoping to expunge all traces of discomfort from my mind and find some doorway to peace. This, too, proved futile because I was relying on a superficial remedy to tackle a crisis that required tangible action.

At long last, I mustered the courage to quit my job, citing my desire to write fiction on a full-time basis and involve myself in my family business. However, the millennial within me was a fiery beast, reluctant to be tamed at any cost.

I couldn’t envisage the possibility of living without an income and quickly accepted a position to teach part-time at a university. Leaving a well-paying career in the media for a less lucrative teaching position required a trade-off between priorities. Driven by the instinct of self-preservation, I chose rest over the rigour and intensity of a relentless work routine, not because I regarded it as a luxury, but because I had finally come to understand that it was a necessary ingredient to prevent myself from going adrift.

Over the years, I’ve tried to achieve a fine balance between work commitments and personal priorities. Every day, I set aside a few hours in the morning to write and prepare my lessons. I’ve trained myself not to harbour any regrets if work doesn’t go as planned. At the same time, I don’t attempt to be overzealous by setting ambitious and unrealistic goals for myself. The neck spasms and stomach ailments have steadily dissipated. The symptoms resurface only when I overextend myself, which, unfortunately, seems to happen quite often. Life rarely permits us the opportunity to step back and reflect; it simply propels us forward at a dizzying pace.

The desire to make more money often steers me towards taking on a heavier teaching load than I can manage. In those fraught moments, I have to remind myself of how important it is to allow my psychological, spiritual and emotional needs to assume centre stage. In addition to an evening walk, I try to revel in occasional spells of silence in which I read, pray, journal and listen to music. When I inhabit this cocoon, my sole purpose is to transport myself into a more pleasant state of mind. Now, I view these activities as short vacations that pull me out of a stressful routine. They serve as a regular reminder that rest can’t take a backseat to our relentless pursuit of money in an inherently capitalist world.

The writer is a critically acclaimed author

All facts and information are the sole responsibility of the writer