As the trip approached, everyone asked where I was going, what I’d be doing, and how many books I’d bring. (An entire library!) But above all, they wanted to know if I was excited. Of course, I was excited! But to be honest, I was anxious, too. My old workaholic values resurfaced haunting me with unwelcome questions.
I began my career as a proud workaholic. I measured my contribution by the hours I clocked and the coffee I consumed. So the Michael Hyatt &Co. culture came as a bit of a shock. It was the best kind of shock, though.
With a core value of radical margin and an unlimited PTO policy, our leaders established that this was a different sort of place. There would be no gold stars for weekends worked or midnight oil burned here. Instead, they cast the vision of a sustainably strong team—sharpened by rest and steadied by healthy home lives. It was a radically better path, and I was grateful to walk it.
But just when I thought it couldn’t get any better, Michael and Megan announced a new benefit: A month-long, paid sabbatical every three years. Michael has written extensively about how he benefits from sabbaticals and decided to make that opportunity available to the whole team.
Our heads exploded.
A Remarkable Opportunity
I was the first employee in line to partake of this glorious benefit. A Florida native, I planned a month of wandering from ocean to ocean: a week on the Gulf in Saint Petersburg, ten days on the Atlantic in Saint Augustine, and a week on the Pacific in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. I figured I’d need a few days at home in Franklin, Tennessee, to conquer the mountain of sandy laundry I knew I’d accumulate.
As the trip approached, everyone asked where I was going, what I’d be doing, and how many books I’d bring. (An entire library!) But above all, they wanted to know if I was excited. Of course, I was excited! But to be honest, I was anxious, too. My old workaholic values resurfaced haunting me with unwelcome questions:
- What if I couldn’t get everything done before I left?
- What if my team resented me for leaving them with a pile of extra work?
- What if they decided they could make do without me for good?
- How would I ever catch up when I got back?
- And, worst of all, would the vacuum left by work leave me feeling lost or insignificant?
But the ocean was calling, the month arrived, and it was time to go. After setting an away message on my email, deleting Slack from my phone, and reminding my team for the twentieth time that they shouldn’t hesitate to call if it was urgent (they never did), I finally embarked on my grand adventure.
3 Findings From my Time Away
On that adventure, I learned that all those anxieties were unfounded. I learned that when in Mexico you should always order the tortilla soup. And I learned that, for recovering workaholics like me, a sabbatical is truly a lifeline. Here’s why:
First, it amplifies the whispers. A few years back, Pastor Ken Groen shared this revolutionary advice with me: “Urgent things shout, important things whisper. Listen to the whispers.” You know the experience: Something pops up—an unexpected deadline or an angry email from a client—and it somehow drowns out everything else. Urgent things are loud. They demand your attention and steal focus from more significant priorities.
