Three Successes of My Recent Sabbatical

(Presented in clickbait-friendly list form. I expectantly await a concomitant surge in readership. It's too bad I don't take advertising.)

1. Having three weeks of pieces scheduled (the two weeks of sabbatical and all of last week as well, to prevent coming off sabbatical and finding myself immediately behind the eight ball) felt great. My stress levels fell, my days felt wonderfully open, and my vision of how I might focus my writing got both clearer and more expansive.

That settles it. I will make this kind of forward preparation into a habit, a practice.

2. My sabbatical rule was that I didn't have to write, not that I couldn't. Nevertheless, when the time came, I chose to reject the writing urge, thinking that doing so might prove deeply recharging at the end of my weeks off. It worked. I had no problem at all staying comfortably on top of my drafting last week. It was easy, and I found myself working on more ambitious pieces than I do when I have imminent deadlines.

3. I didn't write, but I did scribble down the myriad ideas that came to me, ideas that tended to be substantial. I see the potential for a great deal of exploration within those ideas, and I'm excited to dive into them.

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