“What do you do to relax each day?” Walk in nature, have a beer, watch TV, exercise, another spiritual practice, daydream, a hobby, etc. All good ways to recover after a day’s hard work. Meditation is the most direct path to recover yourself. What about sleep/a nap? That’s a really good way too, but in meditation you can settle yourself even deeper, because you can choose to let go rather than wrestle with things in your dreams. These are all effective because they help you let go of the attachments that you’re stuck on that day. If you were enlightened, you’d have no attachments and so no need to recover yourself after effort. These activities help you let go, often by giving you something else to focus on. Same thing in meditation: you focus on your body’s breathing in order to let go of the attachments you’re currently stuck on, for the time you are meditating. If you were enlightened you wouldn’t need to focus to get jhana. Remember, it’s more valuable to develop the ability to let go and recover yourself than to just recover yourself that one time; that’s why we practice. So settle your body sitting not sleeping, your emotions walking if you can’t sit, and thoughts by continuing to let go of what arises and return to focus. It’s hard until it suddenly becomes easy.