I Took a Two-Month Sabbatical. Here’s What I Learned.

Summer is gone, and with it my staycation sabbatical. For the first time in over a decade of being self-employed, I just took some real time off. Two whole months. I set my first OOO reply ever.

I used to think I couldn’t set an OOO because as a traveler, I’m constantly working from wherever, so it didn’t make sense to say I’m “out of office” when I don’t even have a proper office or regular schedule.

Ultimately, what that really means is that I had zero boundaries around when my work schedule could affect my life.

Huge. Freaking. Mistake. I know that now.

I started traveling when I was 18 and eventually created a business out of said travels. There is a very fine line (or none at all) between me as a traveler on a personal level, and me as a traveler on a professional level with my business. That lack of definition has led to work and personal being in the same bucket for over a decade, something that I now feel has been super detrimental to my well-being. I have often lost myself (among other things) in my work.

Most recently, I have felt like my work is running me. 

But how did that happen? How did I get here? I wanted to stop everything and figure out why I was doing all the things I was doing, and why they were all stressing me out so much. Because this was my business, my choice, wasn’t it? I wanted to stop and figure out if that “business” still aligned with what I wanted for me, for this one life of mine. I had my doubts.

So, I hit the pause button.

SUBJECT: Taking time off

Thanks for reaching out. You have just received my first-ever OOO auto-reply message, and I’m using it to let you know that I’m currently on sabbatical, taking some time for personal rejuvenation. During this period, I will have limited access to email and may not be able to respond.

I’ll be returning from sabbatical on September 3. If your matter requires immediate attention, please reach out to support@jumpadventures.com for assistance.

For any non-urgent matters, please circle back in September. I appreciate your understanding and support.

Have a great day/summer!

Jackie

——

I feel I don’t have words enough to describe how deeply I needed this break, and how powerful it was in helping me clear the clutter in my heart and mind and figure out a more sustainable way forward, leaving behind the overwhelming position I had been operating from for far too long. But, here goes…

First – what happened? How DID I actually get here?

Sparing too much detail, I feel it is important to relate why I wanted to take a break in the first place, aside from the obvious fact that I’d never done it before. First of all, here’s a very, very long story, very, very short: Covid completely devastated my business, my personal and professional momentum, and ultimately my mental health, and I still haven’t recovered. 

Sprinkle in a few personal crises over the past two years (not to even get started on global), and I found myself fast-tracked into habitual burnout, depression, and crippling anxiety. I’ve dealt with and gotten through these things in the past, but you know when your ability to compare yourself to a previous low point in your life is in itself a trigger? Yeah…

What has that looked like? 

I have lost track of my original “why” (as in, why I started my travel business, podcast, blog, JUMP, all of it) over the last four years, just trying to stay afloat and stay in business. At times it felt like grasping at straws, like saying yes to anything that felt like help or looked like relief, without considering closely enough the consequences or direction it would eventually take me. 

The result? 

My inspiration all but dried up. I wasn’t writing posts, wasn’t podcasting, wasn’t sharing much of anything meaningful to social media, I even started organizing other people to lead JUMP Adventures trips. There is some big magic in that last one, but also, pieces of it felt strange.

The only thing I could think of doing that might truly help me get out of this rut was letting go of absolutely everything. Having just come off of a year of living out of my truck camper, among other reasons, this summer felt like just the right time to do it.

What was my plan for the sabbatical?

I had listed out the exact steps that would get me into my sabbatical, including alerting people I work closely with that I would be taking time off (all of whom, by the way, responded with love and support – if that was you, thank you – you know who you are), setting up my OOOs, and putting certain things in motion to cover as much of my work as possible while I was out – like tapping other people to help. 

I also knew that my hope, my Plan A (without putting too much pressure on myself), was to completely clear my plate and get to the bottom of the chaos I felt so I could map out a sustainable way forward that could be implemented come September. I hired a business coach to help me, because I didn’t want to face this part alone.

Plan B was throwing the whole plate at the wall, watching it shatter into a million pieces, maybe stomping on it a few times, then going and getting a job at a coffee shop somewhere where my only task would be brewing the sweet nectar of life for my fellow humans. I honestly did not know what I would discover during this sabbatical, and I was open to anything.

I also wrote down these ideas for the in-between:

1. Commit to a workout routine.
2. Weekly massages?
3. Commit to a meditation practice.
4. Play as much hockey as possible. 
5. Go visit Mom & Dad?
6. No interviews or work meetings in that time.
7. Write…
8. Ride MTB a LOT.
9. Create a statement for refusing to talk about work in everyday conversation.
10. Read 10 books. It’s okay to spend time reading during the day. 
11. Give myself permission to rest my mind.
12. Do 4 coaching sessions. 

My biggest mistake

I wear a lot of hats, and there were simply some things that my very helpful team members couldn’t take care of without me. I knew going into my break that there would be things I’d have to show up for occasionally, but we hadn’t discussed when these conversations were allowed take place.

I quickly learned that not setting a boundary around when I would be available to answer any work questions was a huge error on my part. In the beginning, multiples fires needed to be put out. My lack of scheduling foresight led to an open line of communication to me, happening at any time of day or night, which never failed to set my anxiety sky rocketing and leave me wondering how in the world I was actually supposed to get a “break.” 

We finally resolved it by setting a simple boundary. Once a week, over a specific 2-hour window, I’d check in with one team member to talk work and answer any questions or take care of any tasks that only I could do. But only during that time, and only when absolutely necessary. Otherwise, I was free to actually let it all go.

That one simple boundary and that one incredible team member made the entire world of difference for the remainder of the planned sabbatical.

So, how did it go?

I played a shit ton of ice hockey, I rode my MTB a LOT, I took a road trip to see my best friend in Northern Idaho, I flew to Vermont to visit my 91-year-old grandmother, I visited with both of my parents, I met my girlfriends at the gym regularly, I read 14 books (sometimes even during the DAY), I wrote to my heart’s content, I camped in the woods alone, I went on new adventures with new people, I saw Pearl Jam in concert, I picked up golf (to my utter surprise), I worked with my business coach on the hard, important stuff, and once the weekly check-in boundary was set, I did not work or even check my email outside of that time.

I did it. I did all of that.

And I knew about halfway through that the break was already so incredibly successful and helpful for me because I was starting to feel like me again, to see the confidence inside, to recognize my old friends Inspiration and Flow who actually started to come back around.

I call that “finding the quiet,” and I was finally starting to find the quiet again. Finding the quiet used to take me under an hour on a trail by myself. Now I guess I’m in a place in my life where it took me stopping everything for weeks, removing stress from my plate, and actively resting. But… it worked. I feel like I still have a long way to go, but progress is progress, and I already took the first hard step.

Slowly, I began to see a way forward (that did not include throwing my plate at the wall), and my amazing business coach helped me process all of my thoughts and feelings along the way until an actual plan started to form.

Here’s what I’ve learned (so far) from my sabbatical

1. No part of work is more important than mental health. Literally everything else can wait if it has to, things will work out just fine. Or they won’t, and it will still be fine. I plan to pepper time off (including OOOs) into my schedule regularly going forward.
2. Even though my personal identity and business identity are very closely intertwined, there still needs to be a clear distinction between the two. I am not just made up of my work, even though I’m super passionate about it. There is so much more to life for me than my work, and it’s time I start clearly separating the two.
3. There is no Someday, and my biggest goals for myself are just as important NOW, today, as they could ever be. I’ve already started making time to progress towards these goals and feel in my bones that doing so is worth every second that I choose to show up for them.
4. This part is hard to say out loud. I recognized that JUMP was heading down a path that felt less and less like me, and I don’t have interest in building a business that doesn’t feel authentic to me. So, I’m reigning it back in. That will mean some changes that you may start to recognize in the coming months, and I truly believe they will be win-win.
5. Coaching is crucial. I started working with a business coach regularly throughout my sabbatical, and my only regret is not having started sooner. My coach has gone ahead of me in my industry and can speak into every angle of my Special Snowflake Syndrome. I feel less alone, more supported, and have exponentially increased my resources by tapping into this expert’s arsenal of people and knowledge.
6. Most importantly, I have relearned this year that I am whole by myself. I felt torn apart by several things over the past four years, left unsteady, uncertain, unconfident (as humans do, because life is hard). While having help is magic and support is required for almost every part of being human, I am still enough on my own. I have built my life and my business and been successful in both because of who I am, and I will always be enough to show up authentically in everything I do. Even if it takes putting everything on hold to remember that. 

I know in my bones that being a torch in the darkness is what I’m here to do. Apparently sometimes that looks like being still, reflecting, reassessing, pausing, questioning everything, maybe even putting the light out and taking a nap before choosing to take one more step. 

If by sharing my story I can positively impact even one other person along the way, then the rewards are double, exponential…

To anyone considering or in need of taking a significant break from work (or whatever your stressor may be), or even if you haven’t considered it for yourself, I can’t recommend it highly enough. I’m in your corner, and I’m telling you it’s worth it. You are worth it, your mental health is worth it, and you are not alone.

And if you have taken a sabbatical before, what did you learn? What can you share?