Why Rest Can Feel So Hard - Even When You Know You Need To

We all know that slowing down is supposed to be good for us.

We hear it everywhere: breathe, be present, take time for yourself.

But for many people - especially those who are successful, high-achieving, and always switched ‘on’ - slowing down doesn’t feel like rest.

It feels like anxiety. Guilt. And even failure.

So why does something as simple as doing less feel so hard?

As a Clinical Hypnotherapist, I often work with people - mostly women in this case - who describe feeling stuck in a loop of busyness and burnout.

They know they’re overwhelmed, they know they need to rest and practise self-care. But as soon as they try, they feel unsettled, guilty or irritable.

There are very real reasons, rooted in science that we will delve into in this blog post.

1.        Your Brain Has Been Wired for Productivity and Vigilance

When you're constantly busy, your brain adapts to that environment. Chronic stress and over-functioning activate your sympathetic nervous system - your ‘fight-or-flight’

response.

This is where neuroplasticity comes into play.

Your brain is not static - it’s constantly changing in response to your thoughts, behaviours and emotional experiences. This process is called neuroplasticity and it means that the more you operate in a state of urgency, alertness or pressure, the more your brain strengthens those patterns.

You may have heard the phrase:

Neurons that fire together, wire together’ ~ Carla Shatz 

That’s exactly what happens in the brain. If you’re always planning, fixing, anticipating or overthinking, your brain wires those behaviours into automatic responses. Over time, these become habits - not just mental habits, but deeply embedded neurological pathways.

In practical terms, your brain builds stronger neural networks around being ‘on alert.’ So being busy becomes your comfort zone - your default setting. And when you try to slow down or rest, it can feel deeply uncomfortable, unfamiliar, or even threatening.

In women with high functioning anxiety, this state often hides behind outward success.

You might look like you’re coping well, but underneath, your mind is scanning for what’s next, what could go wrong or what still needs to be done. This constant internal vigilance is reinforced by changes in the brain itself.

According to a study published in Nature Neuroscience, the amygdala - your brain’s fear and emotion centre - can become more reactive when you’re under ongoing stress. That sets off a cascade of stress chemicals like cortisol and adrenaline, which fuel your body’s ‘fight or flight’ response. Not exactly helpful when what you really want is to relax, switch off or just be for a moment.

And that’s the tricky part. When your brain has been living in that heightened state for a while, even a quiet moment - something as simple as sitting still - can start to feel unsettling.

Your system has been trained to associate stillness with danger, failure, or ‘not doing enough,’ so slowing down doesn’t feel like peace, it feels like threat.

2.        Guilt Is a Learned Response - Not a Moral Failing

Let’s be honest, so many of us have grown up believing that our worth is tied to how much we do. That if we’re not being productive, achieving, ticking something off a to-do list, then we’re somehow falling behind or not ‘enough.’

And when we do try to rest or take a moment for ourselves, that creeping sense of guilt kicks in. You might even hear that inner voice whispering: You’re being lazy. You should be doing more. Don’t fall behind.

But here’s the truth: that guilt you feel? It’s not a personal flaw. It’s conditioning.

From a very young age - especially as women - we're subtly taught to prioritise everyone else’s needs before our own, to stay busy, to strive, to be endlessly capable, and to not take up too much space. We’ve internalised these societal messages that tell us success looks like hustle, and rest is something you ‘earn’ only after you’ve burnt yourself out.

We’ve all heard the quotes:

Honestly? I call BS.

These messages might sound motivational, but they’re based on a completely unsustainable way of living - one that keeps our nervous system in overdrive and our self-worth tethered to exhaustion.

This is also where high functioning anxiety often sneaks in. On the outside, it can look like you’re holding it all together - managing work, family, relationships, spinning all the plates - but underneath, there’s that constant hum.

The overthinking, the tension, not being able to switch off, the worry that you’re going to let someone down... or that you’re not enough.

It ties in perfectly with something I see all the time in my practice - and have personally experienced myself.

Leading me wonderfully to my next point…

3. High Functioning Anxiety: The Invisible Drive Behind the Busyness

High functioning anxiety isn’t an official diagnosis, but if you live with it, you know just how real it is.

You might:

• Appear organised and successful on the outside

• Be constantly overthinking and second-guessing yourself

• Feel a strong fear of failing or disappointing others

• Struggle to say ‘no’ even when you’re running on empty

• Feel uncomfortable or anxious when you're not busy

(If this is sounding familiar and you'd like to explore it further, I’ve written a whole blog post on it here.)

And here’s what is tricky… high functioning anxiety often reinforces a belief that so many of us carry, this idea that:

More input = better output

(Here's where, if you were sitting with me, you would witness my eyes rolling so far into the back of my head)

This constant drive to do more, be more, achieve more... it keeps your nervous system stuck in overdrive. Your body becomes so used to the drip-feed of cortisol and adrenaline that you start to feel wired - even addicted - to the sense of urgency.

A 2020 study suggested that individuals with high-functioning anxiety exhibit heightened cognitive control, allowing them to push through stress and perform effectively. However, this comes at a cost to their emotional well-being, as they also experience significant difficulties with emotional regulation and are prone to persistent rumination.

This constant drive to keep going - powered by heightened cognitive control - can create the illusion of productivity and success. But beneath the surface, it often masks deeper emotional struggles.

Because constant doing doesn’t always lead to peace, happiness, or even true success.

More often, it leads to burnout, poor sleep, and a nagging sense that no matter how much you achieve, it’s never quite enough.

And when you're caught in that loop, the idea of slowing down can feel unsafe. Your brain and body have learned to associate rest with failure, laziness or the fear of falling behind.

Why Your Brain Finds It Hard to Rest – and How Solution Focused Hypnotherapy Can Help

If you’ve ever tried to slow down - maybe even collapsed onto the sofa at the end of a long day - but still felt wired, restless, or like your mind just won’t switch off... you're not alone.

So many of us think rest means simply stopping what we’re doing. But true rest doesn’t come from just putting your feet up. It comes from helping your nervous system shift into the parasympathetic state - the place where your body can actually relax, recharge and repair. This is often called the ‘rest and digest’ state, and for many women, it feels unfamiliar… even a bit unsafe.

When you’ve been living in a state of stress, pressure or constant responsibility (which, let’s face it, is the norm for many of us), your brain and body adapt. You get used to being in that ‘GO! GO! GO!’ mode.

Over time, that becomes your baseline and slowing down can feel anything but restful. Instead, it can trigger guilt, discomfort or that nagging sense that you're falling behind.

That’s where Solution Focused Hypnotherapy can be incredibly powerful.

Using gentle, focused relaxation and guided suggestion, Solution Focused Hypnotherapy helps:

• Rewire the thought patterns linked to overthinking, guilt, and feeling like you always have to be ‘on the go’

• Shifts core beliefs around productivity and self-worth

• Teach your brain and body that it’s safe to rest, not just survive on adrenaline

• Access deep parasympathetic states where your body and mind can truly rest, reset, and restore balance—physically, emotionally and mentally.

• Encourages greater kindness toward yourself.

• Builds emotional resilience and helps reduce shame or perfectionism driving the guilt.

  
  

The Science Behind Slowing Down

We often think our inability to rest is a matter of willpower -  that if we just tried harder, we’d be able to relax. But science is telling a different story.

Recent research is showing how Solution Focused Hypnotherapy can help gently unravel these deeply ingrained patterns -  not just in your thoughts, but within the very wiring of your brain.

A 2024 review published in the journal Neurology examined MRI and PET brain scans to explore how hypnosis affects brain function. What they found was powerful: hypnosis consistently changes activity in areas of the brain linked to anxiety, emotional regulation and self-awareness.

Put simply, hypnosis helps calm the brain’s internal ‘alarm system. Especially regions like the anterior cingulate cortex (involved in a wide range of cognitive and emotional processes, including motivation, decision-making, error detection, and emotional regulation) and anterior insula (integrating visceral information, emotions, and cognitive processes, particularly in executive control and social cognition). Both areas of the brain which tend to be overactive in people who feel anxious about resting or guilty when they slow down.

At the same time, it strengthens the networks responsible for emotional balance and a grounded sense of self, helping you feel safe and steady in moments of stillness.

This means that Solution Focused Hypnotherapy doesn’t just make you feel relaxed - it helps retrain your brain to allow rest to happen.

It supports a shift from chronic busyness and mental overload into a calmer, more balanced state where rest no longer feels threatening or indulgent, but necessary and deserved.

If you’re someone who finds it hard to switch off - even when you’re utterly exhausted - know this: it’s not your fault.

This isn’t about laziness or lack of effort. It’s about nervous system patterns shaped by years (often decades) of living in a high-alert, over-functioning state.

And the good news...

Those patterns can be changed.

Ready to Break the Cycle?

If this resonates with you, you are exactly the kind of person I help in my Hypnotherapy practice. Together, we can gently retrain your mind and body to feel safe when you're resting, still or just not doing, and enable you to create space for calm, clarity and self-trust.

Explore how Hypnotherapy can help you slow down, regulate your nervous system, and reconnect with yourself.

Get in touch to book a free consultation today