Getting Back to Yourself

Writer & designer Frank Chimero took the summer off (“I quit my job at an opportune moment and called it a sabbatical”) and wrote a short post about the experience:

The summer is now mostly spent, and I am writing to say: not much has happened. I swept away the everyday to make space for the profound, and my days refilled with everyday things. No a-has, no takeaways, no transformation, no strong convictions about the future of technology, design, or Frank. But also: no crises, no existential dread (at least about myself), and very few reservations about quitting as the right choice. I am more spacious inside and enjoying a refreshed ability to attend to the things in front of me. Most people call this a vacation, I guess.

I never really wrote about the seven-month sabbatical I took three years ago because, as Chimero notes, not much happened. Or perhaps more accurately, the changes that took place didn’t reveal themselves or manifest for months (or even years) afterwards. As I wrote after being back to work for a year:

I still haven’t written too much about what I did and didn’t do during my time away — I thought I would but found I didn’t have a whole lot to say about it. The truth is I’m still in the process of, uh, processing it. But it’s clear to me that the extended time off was an incredible gift that has revitalized me — I’m really enjoying my work here and have great plans for the future that I can’t wait to get going on.

While I can tell you with absolute certainty that my sabbatical was transformative, pinpointing the critical things I did or didn’t do during my time off is still difficult. All I can say is: if you feel like you need one and have the opportunity, take a sabbatical. Just don’t expect your life to change that quickly because of it.

• Frank Chimero
• Jason Kottke
• kottke.org