The One Where I Take A Break

When I decided to take a career break in 2021 I knew I had to plan what that break would entail.

I wanted to take this as a moment to breathe and re-energize, but I also did not want to squander this opportunity to do more of the things I’ve put off long enough. I could have easily turned this into a “Let’s catch up on a little Netflix” festival, but didn’t think that would have been super productive.

So, when I sat down a few months ago to begin planning, what did that initial sketch look like? Here goes (in no particular order):

• Enjoy time with the kiddos. My oldest is in school and out of the house from early morning to mid-afternoon. My youngest, who is a toddler, is home with me for the day. Either way, both of them have braved a pandemic for the last 2 years, for my youngest — literally her entire life, so I want to bring them back into a normal upbringing (as safe as we can).
• Read. There’s a growing list of books that I continue to add to an Amazon list. The list is currently at 10.
• Write. Write what? Whatever interests me (like this). Over the years I’ve gone through fits-and-starts posting to LinkedIn, Medium, and Quora. Writing has always been something that has brought me a level of peace. I’m hoping to do it more consistently.
• Learn. I want to keep my mind sharp. I also want to take this as an opportunity to explore new areas. There’s an abundance of online learning and I want to dive into the deep end of it.
• Work. Whether around the house or doing some small consulting gigs to keep me sane. Otherwise.. the Netflix festival beckons.
• Exercise. Made excuses for far too long. Mostly centered around the classic, “I don’t have enough time”. Time is no longer an excuse.
• Volunteer. Same as exercising. I am fortunate to have the means to take a break, I should be using that time to give back.

One month in. Here is the report card (in time consumption order):

• Spending time with the kids is starting strong out of the gate. While the weather has been hit or miss for outdoor activities, we’ve been making the best of it in big and small ways: The older one is learning to ride a bike and how to play chess (more on that later), supermarket showdowns with the little one (sorry Instacart!), small house projects.
• Work is surprisingly busy. I’ve been working with three small to medium-sized businesses on various parts of their digital strategy. It’s certainly forcing me to go deep in areas that make me blow the dust off of some portions of my brain.
• Exercising has now become a daily habit of mine. I’m currently on a 26-day move streak according to my Apple Watch, which is a record I keep breaking every day now. Nothing too major — mostly a mixture of running, elliptical, and yoga (older age requires a bit of testing flexibility and spryness).
• Learning has mostly centered around planning to learn. I’ve decided to focus first on courses centered around Analytics. Next, I’d like to strengthen my competency in Digital Accessibility. I’m also considering a couple of Cloud Certification courses through Google and Amazon. Lastly, I spent an inordinate amount of time becoming reacquainted with chess — to the point where I had to delete the Chess app off my phone. I plan on easing back into it, but with a far more purposeful plan behind it.
• Volunteering is also in the planning phase. I’ve been reviewing a few opportunities on VolunteerMatch. Also, I’ve been considering the Crisis Hotline, but a bit reticent due to the time commitment it involves + the optimal time to be available to support. If I am going to ask the Crisis Hotline to invest time into training me, I want to be absolutely sure I can commit the time they are looking for.
• Writing is bringing up the rear. This post was meant to jumpstart it. I’ve also revisited a blog post I never published called “Why doesn’t it work?”. My goal is to publish it this month. If you don’t see it, please publicly admonish me.

Some photos from the first month off:

Welp. That’s all folks.. for now. Stay tuned for more adventures on how I use this break.

Pieces of me can be found here, if interested: Twitter, LinkedIn, or Quora.

PS: Ok, you got me. There have been some TV binges in the Capric household. Quick scorecard:

• Jeen-yuhs: A-. Fascinating to see behind the scene footage of “the old Kanye, straight from the go-Kanye” juxtaposed against the Kanye of today.
• Dexter: New Blood: Solid B. Although, kind of a must-see for those who watched the original run.
• Yellowjackets: F. I know there was a lot of hype around this. I really tried to like it. But by episode 4 I was begrudgingly watching each episode until the end. With that said, Juliette Lewis is fantastic in this (much like she is in everything else).