Sacred Rest by Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith

About the Book:

Sacred Rest: Recover Your Life, Renew Your Energy, Restore Your Sanity (FaithWords, December 2017)

Staying busy is easy. Staying well rested— there’s a challenge.

How can you keep your energy, happiness, creativity, and relationships fresh and thriving in the midst of never-ending family demands, career pressures, and the stress of everyday life? In Sacred Rest, Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith, a board-certified internal medicine doctor, reveals why rest can no longer remain optional.

Dr. Dalton-Smith shares seven types of rest she has found lacking in the lives of those she encounters in her clinical practice and research-physical, mental, spiritual, emotional, sensory, social, creative—and why a deficiency in any one of these types of rest can have unfavorable effects on your health, happiness, relationships, creativity, and productivity. Sacred Rest combines the science of rest, the spirituality of rest, the gifts of rest, and the resulting fruit of rest. It shows rest as something sacred, valuable, and worthy of our respect.

By combining scientific research with personal stories, spiritual insight, and practical next steps, Sacred Rest gives the weary permission to embrace rest, set boundaries, and seek sanctuary without any guilt, shame, or fear.

Learn more and purchase a copy.

About the Author:

Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith is an author, speaker, and board-certified physician. She has an active medical practice in Alabama (near the Birmingham area). She received her B.S. in Biochemistry at the University of Georgia, and graduated with honors from Meharry Medical College in Nashville. She has been an adjunct faculty member at Baker College and Davenport University in Michigan teaching courses on health, nutrition, and disease progression. Dr. Dalton-Smith is a national and international media resource on the mind, body, spirit connection and has been featured in Women's Day, Redbook, and First For Women magazine. She is the author of "Set Free to Live" and "Come Empty" (winner 2016 Golden Scroll Nonfiction Book of the Year and 2016 Illumination Award Gold medalist). She is a member of the Christian Medical and Dental Association and a repeat keynote speaker at their annual gathering. She has shared her tips on merging faith and medicine with over 16,000 health care professionals to encourage the current and next generation of doctors to treat the whole person.

Margie's Comments:

I thought my word for the year would be “strength.” Last year my word was “courage,” and I learned some new ways in which courage was needed. But after reading Sacred Rest by Saundra Dalton-Smith, my word for the year is changing to “rest.” Last year was one of the most difficult years I’ve had. Lots of illness, chronic pain and fatigue. So most of the year I was out of commission. I was able to do a few things, but for the most part, I spent a lot of time in my recliner, reading, resting, playing games, resting, crocheting, resting. And I started this year with strep and a viral cough that I’m still struggling with. I had to drop out of many of my normal activities. Then I was asked to review this book.

As I started reading, I couldn’t think of a timelier topic! The author has a “rest quiz” at the back of the book, which she encourages her readers to take. I did. And crud! I still need to rest in every area she covers in the book: physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, sensory, and creative. She writes in short but info-rich chapters discussing each of the kinds of rest most of us need. In the second part of the book she talks about the gifts of rest: boundaries, reflection, freedom, acceptance, exchange, permission, cessation, art, communication, productivity, choice, and faith. In every chapter she includes scripture and faith elements, something I really appreciate, as I’m one of those that wants to know how to make my faith more practical.

Here’s a quote from the first chapter that really spoke to me: "Rest is not for weaklings. Hollowing out space for rest is work. Finding time for rest is the hands and feet of the promises we long to claim. It means saying no. It means having limits with ourselves. It means having limits with others. It takes courage to rest in the midst of an outcome-driven society. It takes strength to walk away from good in the pursuit of better."

I highly recommend reading Sacred Rest as well as reading the information she keeps current on her websites. (I received this book from the publisher in return for an honest review.)