Competitive Relaxation
Earlier this summer, South Korea held an international competition to discover who is most adept at relaxing. The Space-Out Competition is a performance art event where participants must sit without talking, eating, sleeping, or using electronic devices. To ensure that no one is sleeping -- since many contestants close or cover their eyes -- heart rates are monitored every 15 minutes, and the contestant with the most stable heart rate wins.
South Korean culture is known for its hyper-competitiveness, and the Seoul event was touted as part physical challenge, part performance art, and part respite from the non-stop demands of daily life. While more than 4,000 people applied to participate, just 117 people were invited to gather quietly on yoga mats, adopting a variety of unique spaced-out positions, and onlookers were encouraged to walk amidst and then vote for their 10 favorite contestants. The contestants ranged from a second-grader to retired adults in their 60s.
The competition has been held previously in such cities as Tokyo, Taipei, Beijing, and Rotterdam, and participants in this year's 10th annual event in Seoul came from all over the world, including France, Nepal, South Africa, Vietnam, and Malaysia.
Visual artist Woopsyang started the Space-Out Competition a decade ago when she suffered severe burnout: "I wondered why I was so anxious about doing nothing," she said, adding that she realized her anxiety was arising from comparing herself to other people's busy lives. "In fact, those people could also be wanting to space out and do nothing like me. So I created a competition thinking it would be nice to pause all together at the same place at the same time."
Competitive relaxing "overturns the social convention that spacing out is a waste of time in today's busy society and turns it into a valuable activity. This contest tells you that spacing out is no longer a waste of time but a time that you really need."
The 2024 winner is Valentine Vilches, a psychology consultant who lives in South Korea and participated so she could share her experience with her patients: "I want to remind them about the importance of spacing out and relaxing and how this positively affects your mental health," she said.
Woopsyang blames technology for much of our global anxiety: "People are glued to their smartphones from morning until night, leaving no real downtime. The constant influx of information in our stress-filled, competitive world prompted me to organize this competition as a means for people to find a moment of rest," she said. "Imagine a brief moment where everyone across the globe stops and rests by doing nothing."
Yes, imagine: the whole world stopping together to rest and reset. Surely you are hearing echoes of the Fourth Commandment here: Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy (Exodus 20:8). While the Lord may not be calling us to "space out," he does command us to rest so that we might be refreshed to do good work in his name.
If you entered the Space-Out Competition, how would you fare? Are you able to rest as God intends you to rest? What steps do you need to take this week to allow yourself space to relax in the Lord, enjoying his creation and the blessings in your life?