Someone said, “The beaten path is the safest, but the traffic’s terrible.”

The reality is everyone needs to get out of traffic, take a break and explore roads less traveled. The truth is you plan breaks that take you off the beaten path or breaks will plan you off the beaten path.

The breaks you plan are far better than breaks planned for you and usually don’t include hospital visits.

There’s a rest from everything and getting caught in the traffic jams of life only causes more chaos and accidents to occur. People need the path, even if it’s beaten, but they also need the road less traveled.

Rest is the reason to take the road less traveled.

Many Americans don’t do rest very well. If you disagree, visit any hospital and begin to ask patients why they’re there. Then fact check the number of Americans hospitalized annually compared to other underdeveloped nations.

What will you discover? The most advanced nation in the world, with unlimited resources, has the most hospitalized population on earth.

Americans spend more money on health care than any country in the world. A report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states 75 percent of those dollars are spent on patients addressing chronic conditions. In fact, almost 50 percent of American adults had a chronic condition in 2005.

Additionally, a report from the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation says, “In some U.S. counties, life expectancies are on par with countries in North Africa and Southeast Asia.”

Welcome to the beaten path where traffic is terrible and you’re a lot less safe thanks to hypertension. Some places off the beaten path actually safer are than your high stakes, stress laden, easy street USA.

Why are third world populations not as sick as America? Rest is a big reason.

As a 19-year-old, I took a trip to Uruguay in South America to help build a church. We finished our part in about a week. The building paint hadn’t dried and they already were moving in and using their new church.

But I distinctly remember something else about this trip abroad — even though it’s been 30 years. These people knew how to rest. Everyday at noon they take a siesta that lasts about three hours. They take naps, drink matte and spend time just resting.

As a teenage American trying to help them finish the job, I was very frustrated when the locals would all take a three-hour break while we feverishly kept working. Now as a 48-year-old student of people, I realize how important the lesson I learned from my Uruguayan friends really was.

Rest is so important it’s part of their daily life. The road less traveled tells a powerful story to all who are listening, “resting is living and all who learn to live well have mastered the art of resting well.”

I can almost hear the rebuttals now. We’re not in Uruguay and taking three-hour siestas everyday is entirely impractical in our world.

That’s probably true, but the point is we purposely could make concerted efforts, to find intentional ways, to integrate block times for designated rest; throughout each day.

Things breakdown because they’re not taken proper care of and because they’re mistreated and neglected. I have seen people meticulously care for their cars while they work themselves into the ground.

If you don’t rest and take breaks you eventually will breakdown.

My wife and I owned a business in Texas and we had a diesel powerstroke truck. We had an opportunity to help a charity drive sending shoes to Rwanda. We took a two-week trip pulling trailers loaded with shoes up and down the eastern seaboard.

Needless to say, after two weeks, we were exhausted as we had been running none stop. In Chattanooga, Tennessee, a red light started blinking and the truck went into a limp mode and we could only drive 15 mph. The truck was resting weather we liked it or not. The mechanic explained the feature on the truck prevents drivers from causing additional and costly internal damages to the vehicle.

Wow, imagine that. A truck designed to know when to rest to prevent itself from becoming more damaged and broken.

What if we allowed ourselves permission to enter daily times of rest. La siestas for the stressed out, overworked, hyper-indulged, American soul.

Almost like trucks designed to protect themselves from permanent damages, we might need fewer hospital stays treating hypertension and stress if we practiced entering the daily rest our souls were made for by design.

Dr. T.J. Kimble of Radcliff is a clinical pastoral counselor. He can be reached at tj@yourbestlifenowcounseling.com.