...When we get too busy, everything becomes either a trudge or a scramble, the doledrums or sheer mayhem.  We get bored with the familiar, threatened by the unfamiliar.  Our capacity for both steadfastness and adventure shrivels.

We just want to be left alone.

One measure for whether or not you're rested enough - besides falling asleep in board meetings - is to ask yourself this: How much do I care about the things I care about?  When we lose concern for people, both the lost and the found, for the bride of Christ, for friendship, for truth and beauty and goodness; when we cease to laugh when our children laugh (and instead yell at them to quiet down) or weep when our spouses weep (and instead wish they didn't get so emotional); when we hear news of trouble among our neighbors and our first thought is that we hope it isn't going to involve us - when we stop caring about the things we care about - that's a signal we're too busy.  We have let ourselves be consumed by the things that feed the ego but starve the soul.

Busyness kills the heart.

-- from The Rest of God by Mark Buchanan

And truly, I reiterate, . . nothing's small!
No lily-muffled hum of a summer-bee,
But finds some coupling with the spinning stars;
No pebble at your foot, but proves a sphere;
No chaffinch, but implies the cherubim:
And,–glancing on my own thin, veined wrist,–
In such a little tremour of the blood
The whole strong clamour of a vehement soul
Doth utter itself distinct. Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God:
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes,
The rest sit round it, and pluck blackberries,
And daub their natural faces unaware
More and more, from the first similitude.

from Aurora Leigh by Elzabeth Barret Browning

I wonder how many burning bushes we have walked right by because we were rushing from one thing to the next, completely unaware of the voice of God speaking to us, beckoning us into an encounter.  There is nothing small.  As we learn to rest, we learn to become attentive to presence of God all around us.