Become A Better Freelancer By Taking Breaks and Yearly Sabbaticals (Part 2)

By now you may have gotten a more clarified view why taking periodical breaks and vacations are crucial to maintain your sanity and keep yourself sharp as a freelancing professional.

Now I'd like to talk about sabbaticals, which simply means a longer period of time where you remove yourself from anything work-related. Remember this basic tip:

(3.) Take no more than two sabbaticals a year. 

I highly recommend taking two consecutive weeks off every year to recharge your mental batteries. Also, two weeks is more than adequate for your body to reap the benefits of easing into relaxation without growing accustomed to total inactivity.

Your sabbaticals could be any random two-week period, like the week before and during your birthday, or the last week of June and the first week of July.

Sabbaticals work best if you'd like to take advantage of taking tours abroad or even locally. There are airlines that charge airfare at horrendously low rates, mainly to promote tourism and make travel increasingly accessible to more and more people. 

It's perfectly all right to take your spouse, a relative or friend, or several friends along with you. However, be very discerning about the way your companions may want to spend their time. Even if a sabbatical is an opportunity to have fun, you need to have some alone time.

Wherever you decide to go and whatever activity you decide to do, never make the mistake of bringing work with you. If you're taking a trip somewhere, it's highly likely that you'll meet people and possibly make new friends. Avoid taking mental notes that you'll later ask for their contact information and talk about your work as a freelancer.

The whole point of this article? When it's time to work, work. And you should work avidly and with all the perseverance you could muster. But when it's time for play, then by all means play with reckless abandon, too.