Taking Breaks: The Secret to High Productivity
In many cultures, burnout and overwork are badges of honor. People like to show how busy they are as a symbol of their importance. In recent years, however, people are starting to figure out that overwork has negative consequences. Although people intrinsically know that overwork is ineffectual, a lot of people struggle to find balance. In addition, people are looking for ways to be more efficient. The reason people love using AI and ChatGPT so much is because it makes their lives easier.
While there is no panacea for avoiding burnout while maintaining high productivity, and balance is achieved through daily actions and choices, there is one tried and true way to pull yourself out of a work rut and get your productivity back: take a break!
When people are burned out, they usually have too much to do and feel like they can’t take a break but that's when they need a break the most. While it may seem counterintuitive to take a break when you are overwhelmed and feel like you have too much to do, it's actually the exact thing that will help you achieve your goals. If you think about it, what we want are results and when we are burned out, our productivity drops significantly. Working hard doesn't necessarily mean we are getting better results. The goal is to be clear about our objectives at all times and work intelligently towards our goals.
There are times when people are confused why they are burned out and unmotivated when they don’t feel super busy at work. In those cases, it is also important to consider the work you are doing outside of work. Taking care of family, having hobbies, maintaining a home and other things take a lot of energy so take into account the overall picture of your life to acknowledge your total workload and understand how hard you really are working.
Whatever the cause, burnout leads to long term consequences so making a change to incorporate breaks is imperative. There are some simple ways you can start having more balance in your life and avoid getting overworked.
Small breaks can be easily incorporated into your day. Here are some examples:
5-10 minutes of walking between meetings
Working out
Mental breaks to socialize, meditate, or just be away from your desk
Coffee or Tea break where you don’t look at your device
Longer breaks are usually in the form of vacations, but they don’t have to be long to give you a break. Here are some examples:
Take a Friday off to do something fun with your family
Take a long weekend and go out of town
Take an afternoon off to go on a hike or go to the spa
Finally, sometimes, longer vacations are exactly what is needed to completely unwind. It takes time for the body to relax so if you are really burned out you may require more time to return to feeling like yourself. Remember that the goal is to rest so taking a vacation where you travel to five countries in two weeks might give you a mental break from work but it might not give you physical rest. Burnout is physical, mental and emotional so if you are facing burnout plan your vacation accordingly.
No matter what type of break you take, use it to completely remove yourself from work so you can get the rest you need. Every athlete knows how important recovery time is to get results and it's the same in the business world. Strategic thinking requires a fresh mind.
Remember to start small, changing your habits one by one, until breaks are a normal part of your life. For example, if you have been working weekends: totally log off one weekend and see how you feel on Monday morning and gauge your productivity level. If taking a break made a difference, you can do it more often until working sustainably becomes the norm.
Keep in mind, efficiency and results are the goal, not working the most hours.