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I Cleaned. Everything.

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A friend of mine came over to my apartment around March and asked me how I keep my apartment from being bombarded with stuff. A really nice compliment because in the back of my mind I'm always thinking, "Why do I have so much stuff? Am I secretly a hoarder?"

Every season I do a clean out of things in my apartment. Most of the time, this activity deals with the cleansing and refreshing of: clothes, refrigerated goods, pantry items, and the most accessible storage closet I have. What this means is that I have a storage closet that is massively piled with "just in case" goods, bookcases I have not reorganized, technology items that have been shoved into boxes, and so much more. I figured that if I wanted to recharge my batteries and situate myself in a space that felt new and refreshed, I needed to cleanse my physical space of habitation.

So I cleaned. Everything.

It wasn't the seasonal type of cleaning. It was a wipe out of everything in my apartment. It took me 3 days to go through everything from room to room and throughout the activity I was met with many thoughts. 
 

"Why do I still have this?"
"Will I need this in the future?"
"I wonder if they make these anymore."
"How can I go about changing my activity around this?"
... and so much more.


When it was all said and done (which really means I decided that a first round was successful) I slept even better that night. However, there will be a round 2.

I heard about a book called "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing" by Marie Kondo and I plan on reading it while in Copenhagen. We'll see what happens.

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I Could Sleep. I Could Wake.

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I slept soundly.

I woke up at 7:30am, without an alarm, and I was happy to get out of bed. 

Good sign. 

One of the things I struggled a lot with during the last 6 months of my job was the inability to sleep at night and the dreaded morning alarm that rang right when I felt like I had just fallen asleep. 

I am a person who loves to work. I put a lot of time and energy into my craft of producing experiences in whatever medium I am met with. 

I know this about myself. I love my line of work. I enjoy designing and creating. I do it sometimes until I literally have to force myself to sleep if I am really enjoying the particular subject matter or project. For someone like me to have no motivation in the morning to get to work, something needed to be done and I know I made the right choice. It was a glaring red flag that I could not avoid staring at every day.

Part of me worried that my sleeping patterns would get worse due to new anxieties that were entering my life, but what I realized is that there are good anxieties and bad anxieties - and these new anxieties were extensions of taking a leap of faith. 

I'm happy to get my sleep back.

What Is A Sabbatical?

I first heard of the word sabbatical in practice when I was at the Hamilton Wood Type Museum in Two Rivers, WI from a guy named Robert Zolna. He stated that his time period was 1 full year. Since he was in the same field of work that I am in, it sparked my interest and as I began to talk to him about his current commitment, I was even more intrigued at the state of peace he was in and how much he was enjoying his decision.

It made me think.
 

What exactly was he doing on a daily basis?
What was his goal? 
Was he lonely?
What made him take the step to do so?


So I looked it up. Being a book nerd, I naturally went to the dictionary first and this is what I found:

sab·bat·i·cal

səˈbadək(ə)l/
noun
1.  a leave often with pay granted to a college teacher for study or travel, traditionally every seventh year.
2. a period of time during which someone does not work at his or her regular job and is able to rest, travel, do research, etc.
3. a break or change from a normal routine (as of employment)

adjective
1. of or relating to a sabbatical.
2. (archaic) of or appropriate to the sabbath.

 

Three things I gathered from this definition were: 

1) Every seven years of work
Reflecting back on my work life, I began to count and the years and it amounted to 7. Check. 

2) A break/change that can involve rest, travel, research, etc.
Good place to start thinking of structure and goals. I know I need to rest, I love to travel, and I'm always researching no matter what I'm doing. Perhaps more definitive structure will benefit non-structured time schedules. Ok, got it.

3) Related to the word 'sabbath'
I grew up in a very Jewish town and knowledge of religious meanings were prevalent. I know what keeping the sabbath is from a biblical perspective: A day of rest. A period of time to absorb solely for yourself to reflect on your surroundings. The folks in my town would lay back, attend a synagogue when the sun went down, and really take in the purpose of the day. So I concluded that what I needed to do was do nothing but rest and reflect with purpose. Check.

So then the question became, how long? To take a break for a year was probably not the best for me in my particular situation so I decided that 2-3 months would be a good time period and that I could gage from there whether or not I needed more time.  

But what goals would I be pursuing? 

I know that I love my industry and the mediums I have chosen for my art work so I decided that my goals would be the following:
1) What subject matter in UX/Service Design would I want to tackle next?
2) What project would inspire me to push my letterpress art further?

Through the next few months, I hope that I will be able to find the answers to these questions.

Why I Decided to Take a Sabbatical

Blue Ridge Mountains in North Carolina.

I told somebody a few weeks ago that I was going to take a mini-sabbatical. 
 

He replied, "Aren't you too young to do that?" 


The question made me uncomfortable. Within those few seconds before I had an answer, I went through every single emotion I felt during the last 6 months while coming to this decision for myself. 

My thoughts were: Was I overstepping my sense of importance in the working world? Did I deserve to go on a sabbatical? I think I'm a hard worker... I'm pretty sure I am a hard worker. What exactly does the word 'sabbatical' even mean? What are you supposed to do during that time? I suppose I am still young... but do I have to be in my forties for this to be socially acceptable? What if I am deemed lazy when I return? Will I be relevant when I return? Is this right? Is this good? 
 

I took a breath, looked at him and said, "No. I'm not too young. You see, the way I work is very different from others - I put a lot of myself into my work and have done so for the past 7 years. I need to do this for myself right now, otherwise, I will lose who I am and will no longer be able to contribute to the world in the way I would like to for the future." 


So I did it.

It's my first time but I'm going to try to articulate the thoughts I have throughout this period. Brace yourselves - I have no idea what will happen.