What if the antidote to exhaustion was not rest, but wholeheartedness?

Coaching is often about questioning the assumptions so many of us take as fact, such as we need a daily dose of the news in order to be connected to what's going on, or we get more done when we multitask, or when we're tired we should rest, or, for that matter, that there are any "shoulds" in this life, period. David Whyte, in Midlife and the Great Unknown, asks a wise friend to give him advice about the exhaustion he feels, and instead of being told to rest, he is told to look for what he can engage in wholeheartedly.

I love the word “wholeheartedness” because it implies going for it with all I've got. My whole heart is a whole lot, if I allow it. This kind of living may bring me face to face with the best and worst of myself and others, but I have a sense that if I protect myself from the worst, I don’t get the best either. There’s no right or wrong. It’s a choice. Wholeheartedness will undoubtedly break my heart from time to time, but I choose this if it means living whole.