The Epidemic of Exhaustion: Choosing Ourselves in a World That Demands Too Much

By Luna Ravenwing

What is exhaustion, really?

We use the word all the time—
“I’m exhausted.”
“That was exhausting.”
“Totally drained.”

But do we truly understand what it means?

To be exhausted is more than feeling tired.
It’s depletion.
It’s emptiness.
It’s lying face-down on the floor, completely out of gas.
It’s the soul whispering, “No more.”

Exhaustion can take many forms—physical, emotional, mental, spiritual. It can come from doing too much, caring too deeply, holding too much for too long. And often, we don’t realize how far we’ve gone until we’ve gone too far.

But how do we end up here? Why do we push ourselves past the edge of our capacity?

Is it people-pleasing?
The need to be liked, to be good, to be enough?
Is it the fear of failure, of being seen as lazy or selfish?
Is it the deep, unconscious belief that our worth is tied to how much we can produce, give, fix, or endure?

“The expectation that we can be immersed in suffering and loss daily, and not be touched by it, is as unrealistic as expecting to be able to walk through water without getting wet.”
— Rachel Naomi Remen, Kitchen Table Wisdom

We live in a culture that glamorizes hustle and overwork while quietly punishing rest. Especially for women, the unspoken mantra is: Do the impossible. Then do more. And never complain.

"We live in a world that has normalized burnout as the price we pay for success," writes Arianna Huffington, who famously collapsed from exhaustion and later founded Thrive Global, a platform dedicated to redefining success through well-being.

If doing is how we prove our worth, then rest becomes dangerous.
Rest becomes rebellion.
Rest becomes refusal.

But what if rest isn’t lazy?
What if rest is sacred?

“Rest is not a luxury. Rest is resistance.”
— Tricia Hersey, founder of The Nap Ministry

The Nap Ministry, Hersey’s radical movement rooted in Black liberation and healing, reminds us that rest is not just self-care—it’s a way of reclaiming our bodies, our time, our spirits. It’s how we say: I choose myself.

So how do we begin to choose ourselves in a world that asks us to disappear?

How do we stop living at the edge of collapse?

We begin by asking:

• What if I didn’t need to earn rest?
  
  

• What if I honored my limits instead of ignoring them?
  
  

• What if I listened to my body, not just my to-do list?
  
  

We begin by choosing a new paradigm—one of balance.
One where doing and being are in sacred conversation.
One where enough is not measured by exhaustion.

We begin, not with grand gestures, but with small ones:
Turning off the phone.
Sitting in silence.
Taking a nap.
Saying “no” and meaning it.
Saying “yes” to ourselves.

Because when we honor our own well-being, we begin to remember who we are beneath the burnout. We reconnect with our intuition, our softness, our power.

And maybe, just maybe, we help build a world where being is as sacred as doing.