How would most of you feel about the prospect of having 6 weeks off work? Pretty good, huh? Pictures come up in your mind of pure relaxation, traveling, resetting your focus, getting some long needed errands run, living into the day. How awesome does that sound! And yes, that is mostly what I had in mind when planning this current period – after all, it was the holidays, and on top of it, I needed to find and furnish a new apartment across country, get acclimated to a new city, and wrap things up in California. Six weeks didn’t sound that long to me back then.
I’m now half way through, and I can tell you, I can’t wait to get back into purposeful work! No doubt about it, resetting, relaxation and detaching is absolutely essential and very much needed once in a while, and I’m very glad I am taking my time. But is it also slightly overrated to just do nothing and living into the day? It may sound horrible, but… I’m done! Don’t need more for now. More than ready to get back, thank you! Is that scary or relieving?
I am sure many of you have felt the same thing at some point. Unless you have a clear goal or purpose for your time off, be it traveling around the world, learning a language better, going through a full cleanse, a meditation workshop or whatever it may be, days can get very long once you have arrived in a state of relaxation and ease. And guess what happened: I am filling my days with an artificially tight schedule now, including a ringing alarm in the early morning, exercise, studying Spanish, reading on personal development, write on my blog, researching on potential further education programs, watching a set of TED talks, and encountering one Miami neighborhood per day. Get stuff done!! And still, something’s missing…
Don’t pity me too much, it’s obviously still complaints from a happy place. I now have three fantastic last weeks ahead of me, including an amazing road trip cross-country. But yes, I can’t wait to finally be productive again!
I’m not sure how I will look back on this time after a couple of months. If my guess is right, my brain will fool me into thinking how amazing it was to have so much time at your hands, and that I should do that again very soon. The truth is, I realized I need a purpose and goals to feel good about myself. Like Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “life is a journey, not a destination”, and it is about time to accept that being on the run is not the worst place to be – as long as you stop once in a while to make sure you’re running into the right direction!
Ready… Set… and soon to GO again!
Yours truly,
Kathrin
Kathrin Hilde's Project Made 