Taking a break

It might not be what you want to do but perhaps it is exactly what you need right now.

So often instead of taking regular breaks, we wait until the point of exhaustion to finally slow down and rest.

Perhaps you’ve convinced yourself that you need to work hard in order to rest or reach a particular achievement in order to justify taking a break.

Maybe you think that rest is a waste of time, as the saying goes I’ll sleep when I’m dead.

But, maybe the best thing for you to do is to take a break right now. Stop, slow down and rest.

Hard to break

I think one of the main reasons that old habits are hard to break is because we’re used to them. When you’ve been doing something for a long time whether it’s beneficial to your life or not, it can be difficult to just let it go.

Even if you know it’s not good for you, you get sucked into the feeling of familiarity and allow the habit to continue.

But, what if you forced yourself to change, what if you made a choice to do something different and uncomfortable? Doing that allows you to open yourself to the possibility of a new life where you do thing that align with the kind of person that you want to be, rather than contradict it.

Overcoming a habit that is hard to break is joyous because you know it wasn’t easy but you did it anyway.

Entertaining and addictive

The thing about social media is that it’s great when you’re on it. It’s entertaining, it’s addictive.

It’s so much of those things that I find myself thinking, I’ll feel like I’m missing out if I take a break.

When you’re logged into social media it can feel like you need to check it 20 times a day. Even though you know there is nothing there that you need to see, the apps are designed in a way to keep you coming back.

And so you check the app again and again even if you don’t really have a reason to.

Checking social media multiple times a day means you’re constantly taking in other peoples stuff. It could be a useful infographic, educational twitter thread or a new recipe to try on IGTV. However, it could also be celebrity gossip, peoples thoughts on relationships or people making fun of someone.

That’s why I think logging out is so important. It allows you to disconnect from distractions and might even remind you that you don’t it as much as you think you do.

That probably won’t mean quitting all social media for good but instead simply using it less.

Breaks and streaks

Taking breaks will always be necessary. However, when you commit to doing something every single day, suddenly taking a break becomes a little more difficult.

As much as you can try and make up for it the day before or the day after, it’s not quite the same as maintaining consistency.

Once you’ve stuck with something as a daily habit for a couple of months or even a few weeks, the thought of missing a day and losing that streak isn’t particularly tempting.

And so it becomes easier to not take breaks.

But as great as it is to be consistent and build daily habits, you never want to apply so much pressure that you won’t let yourself take a break even when you feel like you need it.

Taking a break

In pursuit of the dream stopping to take a break or to smell the roses might seem like a waste of time.

Why stop when there’s at least fifty ‘leven things that you could be doing at any one time?

A great place to start is thinking about why you need a break in the first place. Perhaps you need to recharge, refocus or change direction.

Those are definitely worth stopping for.

Once you’re truly committed a break will never be enough to get you off track, in fact a break might be a necessary part of the process.

I work better when I’m busy

Often when we’re busy we’re overwhelmed and stressed. We find ourselves only hoping and wishing for things to slow down. We tell ourselves when I’m not so busy I’ll have more time for x, y and z.

And we believe it too. But I often find that the busier I am the better I am at balancing everything I have going on. Then as soon as things slow down I find myself much less productive with my time.

Being busy forces us to manage, it’s a sink or swim situation. We either manage or we don’t. But when we have more free time, the pressure is off, there are no obligations and much more freedom to choose.

So it’s easy for the habit of laziness to kick in. But it could just be because you need a break.

Work break

A sign that you might be in the wrong job is how you feel when you take time off.

Is the work break like an escape from your dreary everyday reality that you dread going back to. Or is it time to relax and recharge but you actually look forward to going back.

Career happiness is incredibly important to me so I think about this sort of thing quite a lot.

We spend so much time at work that I think that it’s important that we like going to work, that we don’t dread Mondays and that we get some sort of joy from the thing we do to earn a living whatever it may be.