This Is Our Story

This is Our Story

Humanity United in Action,
Driven By Love and Compassion,
Informed by Science and Reason.

MENUMENU
  • Home
  • Read This First
  • About
  • Cycle-of-Life Season
    • 1 Dormancy
      • Week 01: Human Worth
      • Week 02: Universality
      • Week 03: Justice
      • Week 04: Suffering
      • Week 05: Humility
      • Week 06: Avoiding Harm, or Evil
      • Week 07: Engaging the World
      • Week 08: Order
    • 2 Sowing
      • Week 09: Preferences (Desire)
      • Week 10: Autonomy
      • Week 11: Life as a Journey
      • Week 12: Renewal
      • Week 13: Hope and Optimism
      • Week 14: Self-esteem (Self-worth begins)
      • Week 15: Self-confidence
      • Week 16: Independence (Self-competence)
    • 3 Growth
      • Week 17: Our Future
      • Week 18: Honesty
      • Week 19: Obligation in the World
      • Week 20: Duty toward Others
      • Week 21: Awakening
      • Week 22: Obstacles and Opportunities
      • Week 23: Individuality and Community
    • 4 Ripening
      • Week 24: Honoring
      • Week 25: Excellence
      • Week 26: An Ethic of Generous Service
      • Week 27: Openness
      • Week 28: Transcendence
      • Week 29: Wisdom
      • Week 30: Caring
      • Week 31: Courage
      • Week 32: Citizenship
    • 5 Interlude
      • Week 33: Grounding and Well-Roundedness
      • Week 34: Assertiveness
      • Week 35: Restoration
    • 6 Fulfillment
      • Week 36: Creativity
      • Week 37: Truth
      • Week 38: Love
      • Week 39: Faith
      • Week 40: Rebirth
    • 7 Assessing
      • Week 41: Home and the Past
      • Week 42: Vitality
      • Week 43: Self-actualization and Integrity
      • Week 44: Connectedness
      • Week 45: Empowerment
      • Week 46: Equality
    • 8 Harvest and Celebration
      • Week 47: Flourishing
      • Week 48: Focus and Perspective
      • Week 49: Change
      • Week 50: Finding Our Niche
      • Week 51: Accepting / Surrendering
      • Week 52: Living Religiously
      • Week 53: Celebration and Remembrance
  • Weekdays
    • Sunday
    • Monday
    • Tuesday
    • Wednesday
    • Thursday
    • Friday
    • Saturday
You are here: Home / Cycle-of-Life Season / 5 Interlude / Resting and Relaxing

Resting and Relaxing

Claude Monet, In the Meadow (1876)


Rest is the active component of restoration. It refers to allowing the body to be inactive, comparatively. Everyone needs rest, especially those who are the most active of us.

Real

Technical and Analytical Readings

  • Michael McGirr, Snooze: The Lost Art of Sleep (Penguin Books, 2017): “McGirr pursues his chosen subject in a Jesuitical spirit of holistic inquiry, contemplating sleep as it has been considered in literature, science, history and his own experience.”
  • Matthew Walker, Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of sleep and Dreams (Scribner, 2017): “Walker is no dilettante. He presides over Berkeley’s Sleep and Neuroimaging Lab, where he and his team, along with their peers at other institutions, have made significant strides over the last 20 years in understanding the restorative powers of sleep, and, correspondingly, the dire consequences of not getting enough of it.”
  • Alex Soojung-Kim Pang, Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less (Basic Books, 2016): “His central thesis is that rest not only makes us more productive and more creative, but also makes our lives ‘richer and more fulfilling.’ But not all rest is created equal — it’s not just about not-working.”

True Narratives

  • Benjamin Reiss, Wild Nights: How Taming Sleep Created Our Restless World (Basic Books, 2017). “A historical overview of man’s dogged attempts to master sleep.”

Imaginary

Visual Arts

  • Kazimir Malevich, High Society in Top Hats Relaxing (1908)
  • Theo van Rysselberghe, In the Shade of the Pines (1905)
  • Mary Cassatt, Summertime (1894)
  • Paul Gaugin, Siesta (1892-94)
  • Edgar Degas, Dancers Relaxing (1885)
  • Paul Cezanne, Couples Relaxing by a Pond (1875)
  • Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 94 Degrees in the Shade (1876)
  • Claude Monet, Relaxing in the Garden, Argenteuil (1876)
  • Camille Pissarro, Landscape with Strollers Relaxing under the Trees (1872)
  • Camille Corot, Rest in the Water Meadows (1865)
  • Francisco de Goya, Sleep (c. 1800)

Music: Composers, artists, and major works

Hawaii is a great place to vacation. Its music reflects calm ocean waves on a sandy beach. Its musical specialty is the slack key guitar, brilliantly represented by the following artists, among others.

Ray Kane albums:

  • “Punahele”
  • “Wa’ahila”
  • “The Legendary Ray Kane Old Style Slack Key”

Dennis Kamakahi albums:

  • “Pua’ena - Glow Brightly”
  • “’Ohana – Family”
  • “The Gift of Music – From Father to Son”

Sol Hoopii albums:

  • “Master of the Hawaiian Guitar, Volume 1”
  • “Master of the Hawaiian Guitar, Volume Two”
  • “The Very Best of Sol Hoopii”

Keola Beamer albums:

  • “ Mālama Ko Aloha (Keep Your Love)”
  • “Raiatea”
  • “Hawaii’s Keola and Kapono Beamer”
  • “Honolulu City Lights” (Keola and Kapono Beamer)

King Bennie Nawahi album and an irrestitable track:

  • “Hawaiian String Virtuoso: Acoustic Steel Guitar Classics from the 1920s”
  • Singing In the Bathtub (just try not having fun listening to this)

Ozzie Kotani albums:

  • “Kani Ki Ho’alu (The Sound of Slack Key)”
  • “To Honor a Queen: Music of Lili’uokalani”

Aaron Larget-Caplan, New Lullaby Project:

  • Volume 1: “New Lullaby”
  • Volume 2: “Nights Transfigured”
  • Volume 3: “Drifting”

Albums from other genres:

  • Steven Halpern, “Relax into Sleep at the Speed of Sound” (2021) (72’)
  • Steven Halpern, “Effortless Relaxation” (2014) (76')
  • Steven Halpern, “Relaxation Suite” (2008) (75')
  • Liquid Mind II, “Slow World”
  • Liquid Mind VIII, “Sleep”
  • Liquid Mind XI, “Deep Sleep”
  • “Deep Lucid Dreaming Sleep Music”
  • Frank Kimbrough, “Play”
  • Bruce O’Neil conducting Orchestra of the Swan, “Vivaldi Sleep Project”, “with diverse guest artists from the world of jazz, folk and rock”

Compositions:

  • Fibich, At Twilight, Op. 39, H306 (1893)

 

Poetry

O soft embalmer of the still midnight,

      Shutting, with careful fingers and benign,

Our gloom-pleas'd eyes, embower'd from the light,

      Enshaded in forgetfulness divine:

O soothest Sleep! if so it please thee, close

      In midst of this thine hymn my willing eyes,

Or wait the "Amen," ere thy poppy throws

      Around my bed its lulling charities.

Then save me, or the passed day will shine

Upon my pillow, breeding many woes,—

      Save me from curious Conscience, that still lords

Its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole;

      Turn the key deftly in the oiled wards,

And seal the hushed Casket of my Soul.

[John Keats, “To Sleep”]

 

If sleep is truce, as it is sometimes said, a pure time for the mind to rest and heal, why, when they suddenly wake you, do you feel that they have stolen everything you had? Why is it so sad to be awake at dawn? It strips us of a gift so strange, so deep, it can be remembered only in half-sleep, moments of drowsiness that gild and adorn. The waking mind with dreams, which may well be but broken images of the night’s treasure, a timeless world that has no name or measure and breaks up in the mirrors of the day. Who will you be tonight, in the dark thrall of sleep, when you have slipped across its wall?

[Jorge Luis Borges, “Sleep”]

Music: songs and other short pieces

  • Franz Schubert (composer), Die Nacht (The Night), D. 358 (1816) (lyrics)
  • Franz Schubert, Wandrer’s Nachtlied II (Wayfarer’s Night Song II), Op. 96, No. 3, D. 768 (lyrics)
  • Arnold Bax (composer), Lullaby (Berceuse)

August 24, 2010

Previous Post: « Reflecting – Contemplating
Next Post: Being in Reverie »
  • Email
  • Twitter

Topics

Acknowledging Anticipation Appreciation Belonging Choosing Confidence Focus Honoring uniqueness Judgment Motivation Planning Prudence Remembrance Restraining Retreat Reverie Self-knowledge Tenacity Transcending ego Week 01: Human Worth

Web Developers Studio
© 2023 ThisIsOurStory
About | FAQ