We're burnt out. Exhausted; anxiety-ridden; over-worked and under-resourced. Yet the 'solution' cannot possibly lie in self-care, yoga retreats or the odd massage when this bone-numbing fatigue is a symptom of a desperately unhealthy society. We cannot simply 'fix ourselves' under a system that demands and takes so much of us. What is needed is a complete reimagining that puts a thriving life of abundance first and foremost. Through a Black Feminist, abolitionist and nature-allied lens, Evie Muir takes us on a journey of regeneration that reimagines what a world of true rest – radical rest – would look like, how that would feel. As they look to activists and cultural influences past and present for guidance, Evie explores the core emotions associated with burnout: moving from rage, grief and anxiety to the hope, joy and plenty that deep change can bring.
Along the way, Evie speaks with those who have been disproportionately impacted by, and working in resistance to, burnout – Black, queer, disabled activists of colour. And what becomes clear as we hear about these lived experiences is that a world of radical rest must exist in community – with one another, with our bodies, and with the natural world.
Bold, vulnerable and deeply honest, Radical Rest is a blueprint for change and a salve for the soul. Step in and open the door to a hopeful and healed future.
Evie Muir is both a domestic abuse survivor and qualified domestic abuse specialist, writer and the founder of Peaks of Colour – a Peak District based nature-for-healing community group, by and for people of colour.
Having worked in the VAWG sector for over 10 years, specialising in Black and queer survivors’ intersectional experiences of gendered and racialised trauma, she left the sector when she became burnt out, disenfranchised and disillusioned. Her work now sits on the intersections of gendered, racial and land justice, and seeks to nurture survivors’ joy, rest, hope and imagination as abolitionist praxis. As a Northern freelance writer, she’s passionate about the liberating form of writing as healing and resistance.
