Hello friends, it's Eve here with you. Welcome to Radio Headspace and to Monday.

So I caught COVID a few weeks ago and I got it pretty badly. I managed to go two and a

half years without getting it. I've had all the vaccines, the booster, but it finally got me.

I had to surrender to the fact that I was pretty sick and I had to rest. That meant stopping everything,

no work, no chores, nada. And boy did it feel uncomfortable. But I'm so glad I listened to what

my body needed. And I bring this up because I think generally speaking we're not very good

at resting, especially when we're sick. It's almost as if we pitch ourselves against ourselves

and that we're failing if we don't continue to work. Now of course there are many reasons

for this. Folks may not feel safe taking sick days, there might be a fear of losing their

jobs or that it will be frowned upon. And there's not really an easy fix for this. A lot of these issues

are deeply embedded in our working culture. But I think what is helpful to remember is that we

may all get sick at some point in our lives and we're all going to need support to heal and to get better.

So we might not be able to change our approach to sick days overnight, but we can focus on

cultivating empathy and compassion. We are all part of a shared human experience. And it can be

helpful to remind ourselves when we see that someone needs time to rest and heal that one day we too

might need that same help. And we can flex our empathy and compassion muscles as we go about our

daily lives. It doesn't have to be reserved just for the bigger challenges in life. And a great

way to do this is by strengthening our attention and listening to folks, not just what they say,

but how they look, their mood, and what they might not be saying. We're all probably quite guilty

of saying, yeah I'm fine, when someone asks, how are you? It's almost a default setting sometimes.

But when we start to pay attention in more detail and notice how someone is, we can often see that

they may need a little support or help. Of course, we don't want to push and pry or force folks

...