When I was growing up, lazy was a 4-letter word. Lazy people don’t get good grades, they don’t get into good schools or get good jobs. Lazy was not allowed. Lazy was bad.

And so my lazy self got pushed into shadow. The worker bee took over. There is always work to be done, things to do. And if there isn’t, look around and find something.

It’s easy to create more work.

But when you don’t honor your lazy self, your laziness comes up at the most inopportune times, sometimes in the form of sickness or disease.

Laziness has its merits.

The body is always telling you what it needs. Mine has been sending messages for a few weeks that I’ve been ignoring.

A rainy Sunday was a good opportunity to pause and listen.

What it told me was that I needed a lazy Sunday. A day for self care and self-nourishment.

Sometimes you need a Lazy Sunday.

The Art of Laziness

“Laziness” is a relative term. My lazy Sunday may not look “lazy” by many standards.

It’s not my nature to stay in bed all day or lounge in my pajamas.

A lazy Sunday for me is still on the active end of the spectrum. It means a day when I’m not rushing from one activity to the next. I take my time, honor the transitions between activities.

I act like a human being.

During my morning yoga practice I indulged in two hours of movement on my mat, without guilt or feeling like I had to be somewhere else.

I spent a couple of hours sitting in a chair by the window, writing and outlining a content plan.

In the evening I went to my sister’s house for dinner. I danced with my nieces to songs from the 80s and we giggled and laughed.

I filled up.

Sometimes what we need most of all is to slow down and give ourselves permission to be.

This is the art of self-care.

The Irony of Laziness

Ironically, lazy days tend to be some of my most productive days. The two hours I spent in the flow of writing and content planning were the most productive two hours I’ve had in the last few weeks.

Maybe laziness isn’t as bad as I was led to believe.

This was not the first time that laziness proved her value. Laziness provides spaciousness for me to create my best work with greater ease.

Every time I give permission to my Lazy self to lead the show, I find myself thinking that I should let her lead more often. Maybe I need to explore laziness on other days.

It turns out that laziness has a lot of wisdom to offer.