Charlotte Mason addresses concerns about our body in Ourselves and this week’s lively discussion focuses on the body’s need for rest. Not just our students, but homeschool teachers also need rest. We hope this episode will energize you to consider how to work true rest into your life.
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Ourselves (Volume 4), Book I: Part I (pp. 11-32)
“[this] fellow-servant and brother, Rest, steps in with, ‘It is my turn now,’ and the tired person is glad to sit down and be quiet for a little, or lie on his face with a book, or, best of all, go to sleep soundly at night and wake up refreshed and ready for anything.” (4/I/19)
“The less he exerts himself, the less he is able to exert himself, because the muscles which Restlessness keeps firm and in good order, Sloth relaxes and weakens until it becomes a labour to raise a hand to the head or drag our foot after another.” (4/I/20)
“Once Sloth is ruler in Mansoul, the person cannot wake up in the morning, dawdles over his dressing, comes down late for breakfast, hates a walk, can’t bear games, dawdles over his preparation, does not want to make boats or whistles, or collect stamps, drops in all his lessons, is in the Third form when he ought to be in the Sixth, saunters about the corners of the playing-field with his hands in his pockets, never does anything for anybody, not because he is unkind or ill-natured, but because he will not take the trouble.” (4/I/20)
“If mothers could learn to do for themselves what they do for their children when these are overdone, we should have happier households. Let the mother go out to play! If she would only have courage to let everything go when life becomes too tense, and just take a day, or half a day, out in the fields, or with a favorite book, or in a picture gallery looking long and well at just two or three pictures, or in bed, without the children, life would go on far more happily for both children and parents.” (3/33-34)
“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28, quoted in 4/II/93)
Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, Dr. Wessbluth
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