Cycles of rest

On the seventh day, God rested. So we’ve known for an awful long time how important it is to have cycles of time where we step away from the work.

But with the way Americans (in particular) are addicted to always “being on”, you’d think we’ve found a magic solution to such a waste of time.

We haven’t.

I hope we’ve learned that getting enough sleep is essential to mental and physical health. I actually did an experiment some years ago where I forced myself to have seven hours of sleep rather than my typical eight. On my day off, I slept for 17 hours straight.

So my body was very clear that, for me, eight hours is the right number. I get really screwed up when I travel internationally and end up changing a whole bunch of timezones at once.

But this post isn’t really about the necessity of sleep. It’s about stepping away from work pressures.

Sure, on Saturday you didn’t actually drive over to the office. But did you check your work e-mail? Did you then tell yourself that “this will just take a few minutes” then were tied up for an hour?

Were you unable to stop thinking about that work issue for the rest of the day, even though you were theoretically “off work”?

So I’ve been monitoring my own patterns in this regard. It’s now not uncommon for me to completely ignore my email on Sunday. On Saturday, many times I’ll just leave an email unaddressed – even unread – knowing that it’ll be fine when I get to it on Monday.

This is improving my life with my family and friends, too.

Remember that “productivity” is a concept created by people who wanted to get more work out of others. It often fails.

For you and me, let’s just get the necessary work done. Then do something else.

And actually TAKE vacations.