Apparently, August is the unofficial month to slack at the office.
That’s according to an MSNBC.com article heralding the first day of the month.
And, their experts say good employers know that a little downtime on the clock can make for happy, productive employees. Fewer work breaks mean more stress and more mistakes.
I couldn’t agree more. This theory of necessary relaxation fits in the office and on the homefront.
Like employees who are stretched thin, military wives are up early and heading to bed late as they try to prep for PCS moves, deployments, unit events and the other functions of military life.
When my family left North Carolina for Hawaii, we had three months notice to pack, do the necessary repairs and prep work to rent our house, wrap up the extra-curricular activities we led in our community and find storage for two cars and lots of stuff that wouldn’t be making the trans-Pacific trip.
We also had three kids, one with autism. And I was six months pregnant.
At one point, my husband and I were working on about 3 hours of sleep each night.
So I scheduled a family vacation, right in the middle of our last three weeks in North Carolina. And boy, was my husband mad.
“We have so much left to do. We’ll never get it all done. This is going to be bad,” he said.
We packed the car and headed to the North Carolina mountains for three days to visit the kids’ beloved hero, a life-size Thomas the Tank Engine. The area was beautiful. The trip, relaxing.
Then we drove eastward and spent three days camping in the shadow of the Cape Lookout Lighthouse. The barrier island we stayed on could only be reached be ferry. There were no phones, no roads, no stores and no electricity. We literally could do nothing but be.
When we finally returned home to the ever-growing to do list that now had to be finished in just two weeks, it didn’t seem so long any more.
As my husband unloaded the camping gear, yet one more thing that needed cleaned and packed, he didn’t complain about the lost time or the additional chores. Instead, he said, “we needed that.”
Absolutely.
So this August, or any month of the year, when you’re feeling overwhelmed by work or the mountain of stuff that has to be sorted before the movers arrive, just walk away. Have coffee, go to the beach, sit on Facebook for an hour.
It’s amazing how much better you will feel.
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