Rest and Renewal
We spent Christmas this year with relatives who live on the East Coast in Clacton-on-Sea. The main festivities are now over, and we have entered the fallow week between Christmas and New Year, when the old year has gone, and the new is yet to come.
I like the concept of a fallow or in-between time. It puts me in mind of medieval peasants ploughing their strip of land in preparation for planting the next year’s essential crop, the food they needed to survive the harsh months of winter.
Seeing as I have no actual land to look after, I will traditionally spend some of this time having a good old clear-out with my daughter, who loves to organise. It will result in taking a car full of surplus possessions to the Hospice shop. I guess a clear-out is a bit like preparing the ground for a new crop. Or is that stretching the analogy too far?
Our hotel room in Clacton overlooked the sea, so we had the privilege of being able to see the winter sunrise as we sipped our morning tea, a visual reminder that every day is a fresh new beginning. The Earth is in a repetitive cycle of renewal. There’s a wind farm out in the sea off Clacton, constantly generating renewable energy. A blanket on the hotel room bed was made from recycled plastic bottles, which was surprising, given that it was soft and comfortable. God gave us the ability to mess up His creation with plastic, but also to find ingenious ways of putting waste materials to good use.
Renewable energy. Renewing minds and hearts. Many Bible verses speak of renewal. Romans 12:2 tells us to ‘be transformed by the renewing of your mind’, and Psalm 104 v 30 says: ‘you renew the face of the ground.’
How might the concept of rest and renewal benefit our writing? Rest is essential for renewal. Our bodies and minds need the daily restoration of sleep. There are twenty-four hours in each day, but some of those hours are for sleeping, eating and drinking, without which we would soon be running on empty, unable to function. We are not designed to go for long without either rest or refuelling. Longer periods of rest can give us the time to reflect, prepare for the year ahead, and lay out our hopes, dreams, and expectations before we get caught up in everyday life again.
I’ve had a fallow sort of year. I’ve experienced change as well as loss in my family, so I gave myself permission to grieve and adjust. I have been anticipating a renewed and different kind of year in 2026. My hopes are that I’ll be able to carve out the time and space to work on a cherished writing project in the midst of the continuation of daily life.
What are your hopes and plans for your writing in 2026? Please share in the comments, and thank you for reading!
Jane lives on the south coast, and loves to write when she is not busy working on the committee as ACW treasurer. She started blogging on the ‘Medium’ platform during the pandemic and has a backlog of material there. She is working on her first historical novel based on a family story.
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