The digital age brings numerous benefits for the independent creative. It is easier than ever to communicate your message, build community, and find your audience. We have more tools at our disposal to build a platform than ever before. When compared to previous generations and the limitations they experienced, we’re quite fortunate.

However, any society in the midst of rapid growth is bound to experience growing pains, and those of us within the ever-evolving digital landscape are not immune to this reality. Certainly, it is beneficial to have so many ways to build our creative empires. However, it can be so easy to get caught up in learning and utilizing the tools of the trade that we often forget to shut them off. Couple that with the FOMO (that’s Fear Of Missing Out) and comparison culture that digital technology has ushered to the forefront, and it can be difficult to feel like we’re ever truly doing enough.

We must break past that notion and remember that we are not machines. We are not born to endlessly create content to please the algorithmic gods, nor are we designed to spend all of our waking hours working. Every so often, we must remind ourselves of our humanity, and embrace the increasingly elusive concept of rest.

Not only is rest a fundamental human need. Contrary to what 21^st Century hustle culture will have you believe, rest has numerous creative and health benefits that empower us to show up as our best selves, professionally and personally. As a creative entrepreneur – and one who often must pull myself, kicking and screaming, away from my own work – I took the initiative to convince myself through research, and nail down the reasons why rest is a good thing for those of us on the grind.