MINNEAPOLIS — It’s no secret the pandemic made us more stressed, but results from a recent survey show most of us especially feel it at work.

The survey from the American Psychological Association revealed three in five adults admitted that stress affects their work in some way — whether it’s a lack of interest, motivation or energy. Two in five go as far as to call it burnout.  

And while anyone can burn out, people in certain jobs can be more susceptible — those trying to do a lot at once — like health care and nonprofit workers, and teachers.

That’s why The Women’s Foundation of Minnesota is awarding 40 women statewide, who run organizations that make our state better, with a grant used explicitly for rest.

The “Rest Up” grants, each in the amount of $10,000, are awarded to women leaders so they and their teams can take a much-needed break.

“The Rest Up grant definitely sees us, and definitely acknowledges that we get to live fully and free,” said Dr. Tracine Asberry, executive director of St. Paul Youth Services. 

“To me, the Rest Up is like nothing I have ever seen before,” said Louise Matson, program director at Minneapolis’ Division of Indian Work.

“We haven’t really had time to rest in the last three years,” said Linda Lelis-Her, executive director of St. Paul’s Asian American Organizing Project. “And that’s really important for us to think about because where there is chaos or struggle happening, it’s going to be important to have a balance of wellness and rest that we weren’t able to.”

Asberry said the grants, as well as the simple gesture of just checking in, goes a long way — but sometimes it’s hard to hold ourselves accountable.

“As leaders, we are taking care of home; we are coming to work; we are doing all the things sometimes,” she said. “When we get this Rest Up, you should check on us, LaCora, to make sure we are actually using it because that’s a thing. That’s a thing.”

Matson agrees that throughout the last few years, the workload has seemed overwhelming at times.

“We have a food shelf; it has to stay open and it did and just the delivery model was different, but I feel like we have been going 100 miles an hour for over three years and now it’s like… we can rest,” she said.

Women’s Foundation of Minnesota Director of Community Impact LaCora Bradford Kesti said the organization is leaving it up to the grant recipients to decide how to use it best.

“Rest means different things for every single person,” she said. “When folks wrote in their application, some wanted to use it for professional coaching, some wanted to use it to take a sabbatical, some just need a vacation — and I think that’s OK. Everybody is managing crisis from day to day, so how do we continue to be responsive and that we listen? It’s unrestricted dollars; they get to decide how they want to use the money.”

Asberry added, “It’s a powerful thing when a funder recognizes that the people doing the work are the experts at the work. We are the ones on the ground level working with staff, families and young people, and it’s a powerful thing to be acknowledged, that we are valuable and our people are valuable.”

It’s those valuable workers like Lelis-Her and her staff, who will have the opportunity to step back, finally, and relax.

“I’ve been doing nonprofit work for the last 10 years, and when I came into nonprofit work, I’m like, ‘Wow, its tough — it burns people out,'” she said. “People come in and out and I wonder, ‘Is that going to be me?'”

For Matson, she’s thinking of ways the grant can be used to offer her staff that extra support.

“We rarely see this kind of thing where its just used for our creative minds and how to support our staff, and I’m excited to plan how to spend this money with just staff in mind,” she said.

Almost four years into the pandemic, the women say it’s finally time to put some focus on their own physical and mental health.

“With this, it also allows me to feel like the universe is aligning after the pandemic to say, ‘We have been thinking about pausing and resting and its OK.’ The problems are going to be there and we are still committed to solving those problems — but we need to take care ourselves,” Lelis-Her said.

All 40 women who receive the grants will be recognized Friday during a party thrown by The Women’s Foundation.

Download the free KARE 11+ app for Roku, Fire TV, Apple TV and other smart TV platforms to watch more from KARE 11 anytime! The KARE 11+ app includes live streams of all of KARE 11’s newscasts. You’ll also find on-demand replays of newscasts; the latest from KARE 11 Investigates, Breaking the News and the Land of 10,000 Stories; exclusive programs like Verify and HeartThreads; and Minnesota sports talk from our partners at Locked On Minnesota. 

Watch all of the latest stories from Breaking The News in our YouTube playlist: