Ancient Futures: What Our Ancestors Already Knew About Rest

As we transition into Women’s History Month from Black History Month, we’re reminded that the fight for equality is a marathon, not a sprint. In truth, however, it’s a relay race—where we ceremoniously pass the baton from one community to the next—so the other can rest, reflect, and fight on. 

The fight for restorative justice is unequivocally at a historical peak; as such, exhaustion and burnout is rampant. Civil rights leaders and activists work overtime for their communities’ rights and future liberation, but social activists are not (and should not) be exempt from the freedom for which they fight. Rest is a human right, not a privilege.

For the past few weeks our community explores the question, “what does a rest-informed future look like?” We looked to afrofuturism and its artists to find hidden gems behind this question.

Afrofuturism is an idea. It’s a blending of worlds where the past meets the future, where the mountains meet the heavens, and where the ancestral drum meets the digital pulse. Afrofuturism calls for idealistic imagining of unfamiliar territories in human existence.

Afrofuturist artists are the keepers and ushers of indigenous knowledge, carrying ancestral wisdom forward while reimagining it in new forms. Their work offers clues and inspiration for living liberated, rest-informed lives, reminding us that the future we long for is already growing from ancient soil. 

Octavia Butler, critically-acclaimed science fiction writer, was one of our afrofuturist pioneers. She told stories in dystopian futures that reflect the times, but also reflect what could be if humanity did things differently. In an interview on the Charlie Rose show in 2000,

she shared her secret: “You got to make your own worlds. You got to write yourself in. Whether you were a part of the greater society or not, you got to write yourself in.”

Afrofuturists like Solange blend music, dance, and architecture to conceive her idealistic worlds. Oscar–winning costume designer Ruth E. Carter derived her costumes for the superhero film, Black Panther (2018), from afrofuturism, inspired by traditional African garments of the Maasai and Ndebele peoples.

Afrofuturism is one of many vehicles to explore rest and liberation, and

you don’t necessarily have to be an artist to partake; afrofuturism is a creative framework, not an occupation.

But how can we materialize our imaginations into a daily practice?

Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith is a board-certified internal medicine physician who defined seven types of rest in her book, Sacred Rest: Recover Your Life, Renew Your Energy, Restore Your Sanity. The concept of rest often defaults to the physical body, but there are six other types: mental, emotional, sensory, creative, social, and spiritual. If we can discern the type of rest we need and respond accordingly, that ripple effect of change within ourselves and those we are in relationship with can move mountains.