Here’s a quick preface: WE BELIEVE IN VACATIONS!!! (Excuse the yelling, but we don’t want you getting the wrong idea.) If you’ve been a longtime subscriber, you’ve already heard us go on and on about the perks of taking time off work before.
But the unfortunate reality is that while we’re sitting there dreaming about our next exotic getaway, we need something incorporated into our daily routines to get us by. Introducing the most mini vacation of them all. Drumroll please… breaks.
But here’s the kicker: pushing productivity for productivity’s sake can be counterproductive. It’s probably not surprising that letting employees breathe every now and then can work wonders. The hard part is actually taking that breath.
So sit back, relax — no, really, take a deep breath and relax — and let’s dive into how to rest right.
Until next time, Gabrielle & Charlotte and the nano-vacationers at TDL
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Today’s topics 👀
🧩 Deep Dive: BREAKing Things Down
📖 Field Notes: Upgrade Your Downtime
🙋Viewpoints: What You Can Do
🌐Viewpoints: What We Can Do
DEEP DIVE
🧩 BREAKing Things Down
So… why is taking breaks important in the first place? Here are just a few of the benefits.
+ Today’s corporate culture takes a toll on our health. Our bodies feel these effects, such as chronic stress dampening our immune response. Effective breaks calm the nervous system, leaving us feeling refreshed and capable.
+ Your brain will thank you for giving it proper rest and encouraging different electrochemical states — such as alpha, beta, and theta waves — that promote consolidation and rejuvenation.
+ Breaks may be the key to productivity — having repeatedly been proven to boost vigor and reduce fatigue in experimental settings. Think of this as a refresher before diving headfirst back into your busy day.
There’s no shame in spending your evening all comfy and cozy on the couch binge-watching your favorite series. (In fact, it’s highly encouraged!) But we can balance our brainless breaks with intentional ones, too.
Here is a snippet from our co-founders’ new book Intention: The Surprising Psychology of High Performers sharing a quick and easy approach to working toward your personal past-times.
“Try asking yourself—what is one thing that you can devote 10 minutes a day to getting better at? Ideally, something that doesn’t require travel or significant investment. Try it out for 30 days (do 10 minutes of the thing each day) and see what happens. You might find that you’re 1.347 times better than you were, but also that you want to spend more than those 10 minutes doing it.” (p. 198)
To read more, get yourself a copy of Intention today here.
Viewpoints
🙋 What You Can Do
What is the secret to perfecting l’art des breaks? Well, the truth is that there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Instead, try filling your spare moments with what matters most to you — after all, there are so many options out there! Here are some tips to help you craft your approach:
Get your body moving. Peel yourself out of that desk chair and get a breath of fresh air outside to help boost your well-being and reduce stress. Adding in just a few minutes of physical exercise, like strolling around the block or stretching your muscles out, can help you reap these benefits, too!
…or don’t. For others, a good, old-fashioned nap might be just the mental boost they need. The research says that resting for around 20 minutes offers the ideal amount of refreshment. For those caffeine lovers out there, upgrading to a coffee nap may be the perfect life hack for clearing your mind.
Disconnect to reconnect. It’s habitual to immediately reach for your phone and start mindlessly scrolling the first free chance we get. However, taking a break from your screen gives both your eyes and your brain the chance to recharge before delving back in.
Curious about Pomodoro? Here is one way to break up your workflow, along with some activity inspiration for those well-deserved rests.
Viewpoints
🌐 What We Can Do
The burden of choosing when and how to break shouldn’t just fall on the employee. Even when given flexibility, most are still too afraid to appear unproductive. Leaders in organizations are responsible for crafting a company culture that not only offers breaks but encourages and facilitates them. How exactly? Let’s break it down.
Not ready to have everyone OOO on a Friday? No problem, that’s not the only solution. The crux of work-life balance is flexibility. Introducing flex days and micro-vacations can help employees regularly recharge and prevent burnout.
Your organizational initiative doesn’t have to be complicated.Did you know 62% of American workers eat lunch at their desks? Isn't that depressing? While you may think that taking a full lunch break eats away at productivity, normalizing workplace lunches actually benefits everyone. A survey revealed that North American employees who take daily lunch breaks report higher engagement levels, improved job satisfaction, increased productivity, and a greater likelihood of recommending their workplace to others.
Trust us—it works. Here at TDL, we cherish our coffee chats and long lunches. Once a month, we have “Tasty Thursday,” an initiative from our Montréal office that brings everyone together for more than a mere 30 minutes. We catch up on non-work topics (like debating the strangest-looking animals—our vote is the sun bear) and take a much-needed mental break.
The Spacing Effect
Can taking breaks help us remember things better? (No, this isn’t clickbait.)
According to the spacing effect, learning is more effective when it’s repeated in spaced-out sessions. This means that rather than cramming an entire presentation into your brain in one go, taking breaks between each slide can help your brain digest the information better.
