EP269 Taking Brakes
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Sara Mayer: [00:00:00] Hello bold bull crushers. I'm super excited to be back in the podcasting chair. If you haven't noticed It's been a little bit since I recorded and I want to talk about the importance of taking breaks. 1st of all, it's okay to take a break. And many times there's a lot of guilt that comes along with taking a break, or people feel guilty about taking a break, but life gets in the way to everyone, including me.
Sara Mayer: And we do have a lot of research out there that says overworking and burnout. When we don't take breaks can occur. So 1st, let's talk about why we need to take breaks. Obviously, we need to take breaks to avoid burnout and to continue to be able to enhance the creativity and productivity. Sometimes the monotony of life.
Sara Mayer: Can really take away that spark of being creative. And so it's important to [00:01:00] take breaks to in order to maintain that. Of course, it also improves your well being and it can actually lead to better long term performance. So here are a couple signs you might need to take a break. First one, chronic fatigue, feeling overwhelmed, lack of motivation or creativity, increased stress or irritability.
Sara Mayer: And I want to really pause here, because many times people who really just need to take a break are feeling lazy, or they label themselves as lazy or unproductive and that's not really the case. Many times we feel that we always have to be doing something to be a productive member of society, but taking a break.
Sara Mayer: Is important in order for us to continue to have that enhanced performance. So here's a couple of ways to take an effective break. The 1st, 1 is a couple of short breaks throughout the day, longer breaks, or some mental breaks, disconnecting from work, or maybe even [00:02:00] social media or doing things or for me from podcasting.
Sara Mayer: So I know that many times that. Life just gets in the way and it gets overwhelming and 1 of the things that I'm very intentional about is making sure that what I'm doing, I enjoy and is purposeful and doesn't feel like an obligation or a burden and I've had a lot going on in the last couple of weeks.
Sara Mayer: In fact, my dog had. She ate a whole bunch of stuff, and it's been in and out of the emergency vet for a week, and she's never been one to chew stuff up, so this is very rare for her, and it's been very overwhelming, so I took a break, a little longer break from podcasting in order to take care of my family member, which is my dog, and make sure that she's okay.
Sara Mayer: And that's okay. We don't need to apologize for that. And in fact, we need to make that more of [00:03:00] the societal norm. So there is guilt that comes along with taking a break sometimes. And so the 1st 1 is really addressing. The guilt associated with that. So acknowledging like why you are feeling guilty or what is truly making you feel that way and causing that emotion.
Sara Mayer: And then we need to talk about society over glorifying busyness. And we need to shift that mindset that it's okay to take breaks. It's okay not to be doing anything. Now I'm not saying scrolling on the couch for six hours is a good thing for your mental break. That's probably not what I would plan, but sometimes it's nice just to disconnect.
Sara Mayer: So I truly encourage you to prioritize your health and your wellbeing and to put in specific break times for your mental health and wellbeing. I've been really fat. I love the Olympics. And so I've been really engrossed in the Olympics [00:04:00] in the last couple of weeks. And I love the fact that the women's gymnastics team is talking more about how people took a break from being in the gym and people took a break to prioritize mental health.
Sara Mayer: And that's okay. That's not a sign of weakness or being unproductive or just being lazy. It's a sign of truly refining your mindset and your activity so that it aligns with what you want to accomplish. So taking breaks is okay. I hope you schedule some breaks, put some on your calendar. And just know that taking breaks is not a sign of weakness, but a sign of self awareness and strength.
Sara Mayer: All right. I encourage you put a break on your schedule and then reflect back and see how you feel. So we can crush goals and all the things that get in the way, but we can't if we're working all the time. So we do not need to work double time. So let's get to it.
