Plan, Pause, Restart: Three Ways to Make Holiday Time Off Truly Restful

By Sean Brenner

Slowly but surely, the holidays are sneaking up on us. For many professionals, that means a well-deserved break from work. Personally, the prospect of not having to think about anything work-related for a week or two is what keeps me going through the late fall. If you’re the same way, you might already be counting the days to your break.

But taking a break from work can be easier said than done, especially if it’s for an extended period. It can be difficult to keep your mind off the projects you didn’t finish before the holidays, and even more difficult to get back into a project once your break is over. It’s challenging to figure out where your train of thought left off after a weekend. After a two-week break? It might as well be augury.

Fortunately, there are ways to make all of this easier on yourself, allowing you to truly step away from work and know how to proceed when you get back. Here are my three favorite tips.

Plan Ahead

The most important thing you can do in advance of a long break is to find good stopping points for all your projects. Finish any projects that you can. But even if you can’t complete a project before your break, aim to at least reach the end of a chapter or section.

To whatever extent you can, drive your current train of thought for each project to its conclusion. This is for two reasons. First, because finishing a thought makes getting your mind off work during your break easier. And second, because it will make getting back into things in the new year easier as you’ll be starting a new thought process rather than trying to piece together an old one. 

Doing this takes planning. If you haven’t already, set a start date for your break. Then plan out how you will use the time between now and then. Prioritize what you must finish before you go away and, if possible, move those projects to the front of your schedule so you’re not rushing to complete them just before you start your vacation. Next, pick out good stopping points for your remaining projects, filling out the rest of your schedule.

Of course, plans rarely survive contact with reality unscathed, and you may find that you don’t have enough time to reach your ideal stopping points for all of your projects. The important thing is to focus on finishing what you must and then wrapping up your remaining thought processes as best you can. Planning ahead helps with that by giving you a better grasp on what you have to do and the time you have to do it in.

Transitions

If you come to a good stopping point with each of your projects before you go on break, you’ll help yourself not to think about work on your vacation. Another thing that helps with that is creating a clear transition between your last workday of the year and the start of your break.

I like to do this by spending that last day on a task I can complete in a way that feels meaningful rather than ending the day as if I’m just stopping work for the night. That way, I end the day having finished something. I find that this sense of finality helps me put the work year behind and shift into vacation mode. 

Take Notes

Finally, if you haven’t reached a good stopping point on a project, do your future self a favor and take detailed notes about where you’re leaving off. Write down as much as you can about your thought process and where you think you need to go next with the project. Even if it’s something you don’t think you need to write down, write it down anyway. Keeping it in your head will just encourage you to mull over it during your vacation. You want to give yourself as much material as possible to reconstruct your thought process in January. It will make it much easier to get back into the rhythm of things.

Be Free

Most importantly, take a deep breath. You’re closing in on the finish line. You will be free before you know it.