Vacation, Downtime or Busy Activity?

Everyone in our company had the week off between Christmas and New Years.

The feeling from most people when we came back was "I can't get my brain to work" or "I think I forgot how to do my job".

And of course you get everyone asking each other how their "break" was.

Its always been a personal struggle for me to actually take vacation. My mind always wants to stay busy.

So what is the optimal way to handle our "breaks" from work? Should we plan more frequent breaks? How does this apply to career growth? I'm glad you asked!

Lets get into today's lesson.

SCHEDULE MORE DOWNTIME IN ORDER TO GROW

First, I'm going to start with some definitions:

• Vacation: an extended period of leisure and recreation, especially one spent away from home or in traveling.
• Downtime: periods of unstructured time when you take a break from work or other activities to rest and relax.
• Busy Activity: video games, social media, binge-watching TV, or any other activity that makes your brain think just enough about other stuff to forget about your real life although not really progress on anything meaningful.

I have to admit... of the three categories, I still probably spend most my non-working time in busy activity. Some people call these bad habits. I did write a fun article about how to leverage these "distractions" previously here.

Vacations are great, but typically only happen a few times a year. Not really something you can build a habit around.

So lets dive into what Downtime is and how we can leverage it more in 2024.

Research has shown that our brains need regular periods of rest and reflection in order to function optimally. Taking regular breaks or downtime allows us to tap into our unconscious and conscious minds in ways that would be impossible while we are in a state of alertness.

It's kind of like how ideas come to you when you are in the shower or on a walk. Our creative muscles open up when we schedule downtime in our lives.

Meanwhile... what do most of us do? We jump into busy activity... keeping our brain just stimulated enough to block out that creativity.

Here are some examples of effective "Downtime".

1. Walking
2. Napping
3. Meditation
4. Breathing Exercises
5. Yoga/Stretching
6. People Watching
7. Drawing/coloring
8. Gardening
9. Bathtub Time
10. Bird Watching
11. Reading articles written by me (haha, just kidding)

Downtime activities like this prevent burnout, reduce stress, and increase our creativity MUCH better than busy activities.

Lets get into Action:

ACTION TIME:

1. Take a moment to think about how much time you spend on "busy activities" every day.
2. What would happen if you switched just a few of those busy activities to Downtime activities?
3. Plan at least one downtime activity every day. Put it on your calendar. Build the habit of planned downtime to unleash your creativity and reduce burnout from work!
4. If you lead a team, how can you plan downtime during their daily schedule?

I appreciate the moments you've spent reading today's article and look forward to providing you more fresh, actionable content week after week. We as leaders need to inspire growth and learning in the workplace, now more than ever. And sometimes it may even be giving our team a moment to breathe to spark creativity and growth. Thank you for subscribing!

Your Friend,

Dan