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Vendor
Mohrbooks Literary Agency
Sebastian Ritscher
Original language
English

REST IS RESISTANCE

Tricia Hersey

A Manifesto

Disrupt and push back against capitalism and white supremacy by connecting to the liberating power of rest, daydreaming, and naps as a foundation for healing and justice. Tricia Hersey, aka The Nap Bishop, encourages us to elevate rest as a form of resistance and a divine human right.
What would it be like to live in a well-rested world? Far too many of us have claimed productivity as the cornerstone of success. Brainwashed by capitalism, we subject our bodies and minds to work at an unrealistic, damaging, and machine-level pace -feeding into the same engine that enslaved millions into brutal labor for its own relentless benefit.

In Rest Is Resistance, Tricia Hersey, aka the Nap Bishop, casts an illuminating light on our troubled relationship with rest and how to imagine and dream our way to a future where rest is exalted. Our worth does not reside in how much we produce, especially not for a system that exploits and dehumanizes us. Rest, in its simplest form, becomes an act of resistance and a reclaiming of power because it asserts our most basic humanity. We are enough. The systems cannot have us.

Rest Is Resistance is rooted in spiritual energy and centered in Black liberation, womanism, somatics, and Afrofuturism. With captivating storytelling and practical advice, all delivered in Hersey's lyrical voice and informed by her deep experience in theology, activism, and performance art, Rest Is Resistance is a call to action, a battle cry, a field guide, and a manifesto for all of us who are sleep deprived, searching for justice, and longing to be liberated from the oppressive grip of Grind Culture.

This is not a self-care book and isn't a prescriptive treatment for naps and rest. It is a deprogramming and healing from "grind culture" and a social justice movement that centers rest as a tool to dismantle and disrupt capitalism and white supremacy: it is a manifesto.

Tricia Hersey is an artist, poet, theologian and community organizer. She is the founder of The Nap Ministry, an organization that examines rest as a form of resistance by curating sacred spaces for the community to rest via Collective Napping Experiences, immersive workshops, performance art installations, and social media. Tricia is a global pioneer and originator of the movement to understand the liberatory power of rest. She is the creator of the Rest is Resistance and Rest as Reparations frameworks. Her research interests include Black liberation theology, womanism, somatics, and cultural trauma. Tricia is a Chicago native and currently lives in Georgia.
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Book

Published 2022-10-11 by Little Brown / Spark

Book

Published 2022-10-11 by Little Brown / Spark

Comments

Tricia Hersey's Nap Ministry changed my life. Rest Is Resistance is more than a book - it is one of the most vital interventions of our time.

UK: Octopus

Exquisitely beautiful... a book to read and reread with a pen in hand and pad beside you; one that you will find yourself wanting to give to friends, coworkers, and strangers.

Rest Is Resistance left me feeling elated. This book reminds us that we are in charge of our restoration. In these pages, Tricia has offered us an invitation to take our power back.

Deep beneath the marked surfaces of unyielding productivity, shrouded by the thick plumes of the city, a movement is afoot. Or rather, a stillness. A break from the sensorial monocultures that incarcerate us. A refusal to give our bodies to the engines that world the world. A soft theology of the fugitive. An invitation to the postactivism of rest. If this rude stillness of rest is a sermon, Tricia Hersey is its underground prophet....

This book will save lives and transform the world. Tricia Hersey speaks the truth about rest, a truth that begins our unraveling from the lies of white supremacy and capitalism. Gradually we refuse to live at a machine pace. We surrender to the beautiful experiment of being human. We return to our truest selves. This is a book to read again and again, slowly, savoring it sentence by sentence. I'll be giving copies to everyone I work with and everyone I love.

Tricia Hersey whispers 'rest is a form of resistance' to me, to you, to those who think resistance is always movement. Her message is essential: Sit. Lay down. Slow down. Rest is a necessary step in reclaiming our power to resist systemic oppression.

NPR Life Kit write-up about "how to embrace the Danish lifestyle of rest and coziness" with REST IS RESISTANCE featured. Read more...

The Instagram page @thenapministry, with roughly 477,000 followers, has changed lives. Founded in 2016 by artist and theologian Tricia Hersey, the Nap Ministry is an organization that believes rest is "a form of resistance and reparations" and examines the liberating power of naps. Now Hersey is coming out with a manifesto of sorts that expands on the meaning and power of rest. Rooted in Black liberation, womanism, somatics, and Afrofuturism, Rest Is Resistance connects the dots between capitalism and white supremacy. Rest, Hersey posits, asserts humanity and pushes back against all-consuming grind culture. "All of culture is collaborating for us not to rest," Hersey writes - and she wants to change that. Read more...

Hersey's ministry background shines through in her passionate and eloquent arguments that read like a clear-eyed sermon... the provocative message will appeal to those tired of grind culture.

The New York Times ran a wonderful profile of Tricia Hersey. Read more...

Sometimes the window is open and a breeze comes through singing a sweet song: it is nap time. Grandmother sits on the front porch; grandpapa cuts the grass. It is a song. You nap. I nap. The angels hug us. A book settles beside us. Rest Is Resistance. It is a war we will win.

REST IS RESISTANCE is a clarion call for our generation. In this pioneering book, Tricia Hersey invites us all to opt out of "grind culture" and embrace our basic and sacred human right to self-care, relaxation, and rest. As Hersey makes clear, this revolutionary praxis is especially important for Black people who have historically and contemporarily been primarily valued for our labor. Ultimately, Hersey reminds us that leisure is not only a way to restore and rejuvenate, but it is also an act of resistance as we hurtle towards end-stage capitalism

Tricia Hersey's voice is vivid, well-researched and evocative. She writes intimately about the liberating power of rest and how we imagine a new world outside of capitalist systems. Hersey's manifesto towards radical restoration is lifegiving; I found myself deeply moved by her principles & authenticity. She has established herself as a preeminent voice in the world of Black liberation theology and beyond.

Lay your ass down and read this book right now! Rest Is Resistance is an inspiring, affirming and revolutionary balm. Tricia and the Nap Ministry's ethos have changed my life, and work, for the better and this manifesto is no different. With compassionate inquiry and actionable offerings, Tricia divinely guides us further into rest, ourselves, and our collective liberation.

With Rest Is Resistance, Tricia Hersey helps us understand that rest is how we can sustain ourselves as we awaken to the truth of the toxic systems of our times. She is not ahead of or above us in this journey, but right here in the midst of social media addiction and overwork and systemic frustration, shouting that she can see an opening... Naps and all kinds of rest are portals through which we return to ourselves. Tricia, sounding like an ancestor who is DONE seeing us suffer, is inviting us to join her and step on through.

Over the span of several days, I read REST IS RESISTANCE as a meditative practice to alter my pace and ground my soul in this frenzied grind culture. Unlike other texts that list a litany of strategies to stave off exhaustion, Hersey presents a lullaby of liberation that frames rest as a portal for healing and imagination available to all. Once you open this book prepare to breathe more deeply and come to see the world more clearly. In the words of the Nap Bishop, 'The Doors of the Nap Temple are open. Won't you come?

REST IS RESISTANCE is an instant New York Times Bestseller, heading straight to #4!