Taking It Easy On Yourself While You're Taking It Easy
So you're taking a break from work, but are you being kind to yourself while you take it? In a productivity-driven culture, it's easy to allow self-judgment to sabotage much-needed rest.
Welcome to the 9th edition of This is Not Advice—
my not-advice column for premium subscribers of What Works!
Before we dive into today's column, I have a few announcements.
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I've opened up some time on my calendar for one-on-one strategy sessions. If you'd like to get my insight on a business opportunity, creative project, or strategic decision, I'd love to help.
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If you're a podcaster or perhaps an aspiring podcaster looking to uplevel your show or offload most of the work, YellowHouse.Media has openings for new shows now! Plus, we also have strategy sessions available for planning your editorial calendar, streamlining your workflow, improving your sound or sound design, and more.
During last week's premium workshop on breaking the self-sabotage cycle, I fielded similar questions from two participants. Essentially:
What happens when the thing you're sabotaging is taking a break?
How do you let go of negative self-talk and self-judgment to get the rest you need?
First, that question says a ton about the state of our culture today. We need as much (if not more) help with following through on taking a break as we do following through on a big, hairy project.
Second, I have lots of experience with this!
I've been on a self-imposed "break" since the end of 2021. My break started as a desperate move to regain my mental health. Then, it became a book-writing sabbatical. And then, I kept extending my break by taking on short, lightweight "jobs" that felt manageable given my limited capacity.
I finally have an idea of what kind of work I want to do next—but still no decisions about the operational container I'm going to put around it yet. I still don't have the capacity to make objective-ish decisions about the future.
Have I felt bad about not producing more income over the last two years?
Definitely. Have I judged myself for being crispy and fragile after burning out? You bet. Have I denied help and overindulged in the activities that I love most during this time? Absolutely.
But instead of rushing myself out of this break and into the next big thing, I've stuck with it.
I certainly didn't have a "plan" for my break other than "write book." But upon reflection, I think there are four strategies that have helped me follow through on taking a longer-than-expected break:
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Acknowledging what I need and affirming what restores me
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Focusing on the lighter lifts to stretch financially
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Being honest about what I can go without
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Being honest about what I can't do
Acknowledging What I Need & Affirming What Restores Me
I'm reminded of my conversation with Mara Glatzel, the author of Needy, from earlier this year. Mara and I talked about the challenge of not only knowing what we need but also acknowledging that we have needs in the first place. Part of the problem, Mara told me, is that we don't create the "time and space to be in relationship with ourselves." Without a close relationship, she explained, it's difficult to "even have a working understanding of what we need to begin with."
At the end of 2021, the only thing I knew was that I absolutely needed to take a break. I needed a break from other people's needs and from self-imposed responsibilities. But that's a "negative" need, right? I knew what I needed to not have rather than any positive need. I couldn't tell you what I needed more of in my life or work.
But by the end of my book-writing sabbatical, I had a better idea of my positive needs. I needed more reading, researching, and long-form writing. I needed a variety of creative outlets. I needed more of the kind of work I enjoy doing in the wee hours of the morning or on weekends.
Acknowledging those needs gave me a path to affirming what restores me. Sure, it's entirely possible to "have too much of a good thing." I knew that the quality of what I was creating would suffer if I didn't pace myself. But I also recognized that the more I abandoned old filters and objectives, the more work (as I was starting to redefine it) actually restored my wholeness.
Part of acknowledging my needs was also recognizing that I could only stretch my savings and book advance so far.
Focusing on Lighter Lifts to Stretch Financially
After working for myself for 14+ years, I know a host of ways to generate income. And I also know that many of those strategies don't meet my well-being needs, even if they're great for my financial needs.
Many of those strategies don't meet my well-being needs,
even if they're great for my financial needs.
For instance, I could take on some coaching clients and generate $5-10k per month pretty easily. Or, at least, I could have when people still thought of me as a business coach. But coaching is a heavy lift for me. I'm pretty good at it, and I even enjoy it in the moment. However, the impact of coaching's emotional weight compounds quickly—and it becomes unmanageable.
Teaching, on the other hand, is a lighter lift. Last summer, I taught some classes for my old education partner, CreativeLive. I developed 3 new classes based on CreativeLive's specifications, flew to Seattle, delivered them direct-to-camera, and then came home. For many people, that would have been quite a burden. But it fell into the bucket of things that makes me feel pretty good—familiar people who don't need anything from me except the work I've done, super-contained time frame, satisfying results, etc.
That gig padded my bank account a bit and helped me stretch out my break.
Then, last December, I offered a limited "course" called Recovering Overachiever Club. I intentionally designed it only to involve work that I knew was lightweight for me—sacrificing some revenue, for sure, but maintaining my sanity. In January, I taught a 3-part workshop. Again, I purposefully designed it to have none of the work that drains me. Later in the spring, I offered some workshops through YellowHouse.Media. Those went really well and gave me a chance to experiment with some of the work that is more draining for me (like doing literally anything on Zoom) but in a contained and manageable way.
That brings you up to date with where I'm at now. I need to keep my foot on the gas financially (Insight Intensives are back after a decade! and I have a fall program for coaches, trainers, and managers called Work In Practice).
But I still feel good about keeping my work within the tolerable zone.
Being Honest With What I Can Go Without
When I say I've had to be honest about what I can go without, I mean that both financially and sort of existentially.
Yes, I've been very mindful about my consumption over the last two years. Going largely without paid work isn't a walk in the personal finance park. I've had some selective splurges and replaced things that were absolutely necessary to replace—but by and large, my spending is a fraction of what it once was.
And since I'm being honest here, the ease I've experienced paring back has been a pleasant surprise! I've found that when I'm not depleted day after day by work that overwhelms my capacity and abilities, I don't feel the same drive to consume. I'm not looking for the dopamine rush of buying something new. I'm not trying to fill some hole in my life with a new pair of sneakers or a sweater.
Consuming less means, of course, that I don't need to make as much money to get by. As I always remind my husband, cutting back expenses has its limits. But it certainly doesn't hurt.
It’s like told me in our conversation this spring:
What I need is enough money to do the basics, right? So, like, [making] sure that we have a roof over our head and that whatever [the kids] need, they have, food, and then community. Those are kind of the big things.
We pay ourselves $80,000 salary each, and we maybe take some distributions every now and then when we have a good year, but that in itself is enough to sustain us. And so we know that we have it. We have ‘the enough,’ right? And I feel like that takes so much pressure off of us to be like, ‘Okay, let's double the business! Because that kind of income claim marketing is so like ‘rat race,’ like ‘hamster wheel.’ Like you're just kind of constantly pushing for no reason. If you've already got all your bases covered, why do you have to keep pushing?
What's been much more difficult for me over this long break is being honest about my own expectations.
By that, I mean what I hope to create, accomplish, and achieve in this world.
And you might think, "Hey Tara, didn't you write a whole book about letting go of that shit?"
I'd reply, "Damn straight, I did. But I also fully admitted to being a work-in-progress."
I've done a lot of work on letting go of what I'll call my "merit badge" stuff. I'm pretty good at realizing the opportunity I'm considering is just a merit badge and not something that actually meets my needs or piques my interest.
The bigger-picture, longer-term stuff is where I struggle today. There are fewer titles, dollar signs, or metrics involved in my ideas of the future than there used to be. But I still wrestle with acknowledging that certain things I want to do or be are likely out of my ability, at least in the way I envision them. The amorphous, almost indefinable expectations I have/had for myself can often sneak up on me.
So I'm learning that I need to sit with those expectations when they arrive unexpectedly and gently work through what's going on—and what I can go without.
Being Honest About What I Can't Do (Yet, or Ever)
I believe that there are some work activities that will be in my capacity again—one day. And there are some work activities that I need to exclude from any vision of the future because they'll never fit my capacity.
That second piece is a pretty clear filter. But the first one—the things I can't do yet—is trickier.
I'd say about once per quarter for the last two years, I've had the chance to check in with myself and gauge my ability to jump back into those work activities. I say that I've "had the chance" because I don't want you to think that I had the foresight to plan those check-ins. But in hindsight, it's something I'll continue to do and something I would do again if I have to take an extended break in the future.
Looking back over those check-ins, I might even call them emotional post-mortems. In case the idea of a post-mortem is new, a post-mortem is essentially a debrief after a project or initiative is complete. What went right? What went wrong? What did we learn? How would we do things differently next time?
For an emotional post-mortem, I'm looking at: How did that feel? What was energizing? What was draining? Could I have made the experience easier on myself? On others?
For instance, after I taught my audio essay workshop earlier this year, I asked myself what I liked about teaching in that format, that class size, and that subject matter. I also considered where I might have stretched myself a bit thin.
Sure, I checked in with the substance and style of the workshop, too—a more traditional post-mortem. I made notes about how I would do things differently in the future. However, I also needed to know how I felt about doing it again in the future. Would it be a wise choice? In that case, the answer was definitely "yes." But that wasn't a given.
Breaking the Self-Sabotage Cycle
In Thursday's workshop, I shared four steps for breaking the self-sabotage cycle. I'll get to those in a moment, plus how each step applies to getting in your own way when it comes to taking a break. But first, it's critical to understand a few things about self-sabotage:
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These behaviors are not moral failings or deficiencies
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There isn't something "wrong" with you because you get down on yourself about working while on a break
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Self-sabotage behaviors are habits and patterns that developed in response to a real need
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At some point, these behaviors helped you stay safe, stay in a relationship, or accomplish something
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In order to change the habit, we have to get down to the root cause—typically a relationship dynamic or a cultural, political, or economic narrative
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And once we've got the root cause, we need to replace the habit rather than just quit it
Step 1: Identify your triggers.
I hate to use the word "trigger" here because I know it's overused and has specific therapeutic connotations... but I just couldn't find another word to use.
What scenarios are you most likely to find yourself engaged in self-sabotage?
Specifically, are there certain conditions that will provoke your habits when taking a break from work?
Identifying the triggers of self-sabotage helps you become aware of the behavior before it starts—which gives you a chance to make a plan.
Step 2: Name the root cause.
Why do these conditions or scenarios provoke your self-sabotage? Can you identify a time when that behavior would have helped you rather than harm you?
When it comes to judging yourself for taking a break or paring back on work, there are a number of root causes that come immediately to mind for me.
First, meritocratic norms—if hard work is how you succeed, not working is a big problem.
Second, self-worth struggles—if you understand your value and self-worth through the work you do, not working is an affront to that understanding. Self-worth struggles are most often related to social and political systems that relegate one or more of your identities to the "out-group."
Third, lack of safety net—if you're aware of the precariousness of your work-life or financial system, taking a break (even a paid vacation) can feel like it puts your livelihood in jeopardy. And that precarity and lack of safety net is real. Whether you have significant savings or (more likely) not, few people have outside help they can lean on if things go sideways.
Step 3: Plan for alternative action.
What will you do instead of your usual behavior?
If you know that taking a break from work triggers negative self-talk, what can you do instead? For me, it was simply reminding myself that I was doing what was necessary to take care of myself.
Maybe you plan to take a walk, or cuddle your dog, or listen to a favorite song when self-judgment creeps in. Maybe you put down your device and cook a meal. Maybe you read an old What Works post about the ways social and political systems convince us to ignore our own needs. I'd link to one, but frankly, most of them are about that in one way or another.
Step 4: Create a new story.
Self-sabotage is tricky because of its story. You might not know exactly what that story is—but that's because it's buried so deep in some part of your brain that it seems like it's just True. Self-sabotage means something to you.
The final step in breaking the cycle, then, is to give your new plan and its outcome meaning. Why is changing this important to you? How will things be different? What would it mean to you to adopt your new plan and see it work?
When we figure out the root cause of our habits, we learn something about the story that's buried in our brains. To make change real, we need a different, meaningful story to replace it.
One story I've often found helpful is a simple story of identity. "I'm the kind of person who..." For this issue of taking a break, the story might be "I'm the kind of person who cares for herself," or, "I'm the kind of person who enjoys rest and stillness." By making rest part of our identities, we can shed the identity of "person who works on vacation."
Final Thoughts
This feels like an appropriate topic for the week leading up to the Labor Day holiday in the US. Labor Day reminds us (hopefully) of the benefits we enjoy thanks to the hard-won victories of workers and labor organizers over the last 150 years. One of those victories is rest.
At one time, workers didn't get a break. They worked six days a week for 10-14 hours. There was no such thing as a vacation for workers. There were no "weekends." Leisure and rest were only for the rich.
But I sincerely hope you can take a rest this weekend without thinking about work.