Here’s the most deceiving advice on work I’ve ever received:
The less you work, the less likely you are to burn out.
It made me miserable.
You see, when I became a full-time writer about six months ago, I wanted to get everything right. I practiced yoga and meditation for my mental health. I also went to bed on time, ate healthily, and never worked more than five hours per day. Sounds good, right?
Well, something unexpected happened.
Why Less Work Isn’t Always the Solution
Suddenly, I started to feel drained. Unmotivated. Tired. I recognized these feelings as the warning signs of burnout. But that only made me more agitated. What am I doing wrong? I’m following the rules of the game. Why am I not feeling rested?
The lie gradually began to expose itself.
It occurred to me that I never switched off. I might have had five-hour workdays, but, in reality, I was working 24/7. Always pondering on ideas. Always anxious about the next article. Always spinning inside a cyclone of stress.
I felt like a closed laptop that was supposed to go into sleep mode — but instead, it just kept overclocking, overheating, draining power.
As it turned out, I was physically away from work. But mentally, I was hustling myself to death.
The lesson? Sustainable productivity isn’t always about working less. It’s about ruminating less. You can escape your (home-)office and go anywhere you like. But if you don’t have a mental safe space, you’ll never switch off.
So, here are seven practical ways to create that safe space — and truly detach from your work.
1. Build Pre-Work and After-Work Rituals
In a recent post, I talked about the importance of a pre-work ritual. That is, you always perform the same sequence of actions before starting to work. This nudges your mind into being more productive during your working hours.
Likewise, you can build an after-work ritual.
Try to perform the same actions every time you leave the office or your desk at home. It could be…
- a walk around the block,
- listening to your favorite music,
- or a hot chocolate at the café of your choice.
Choose an action or a sequence that comes to you naturally. Once you’ve found your ritual, feed it by performing it as often as possible.
But, of course, this ritual only functions if you don’t plunge back into the grind until the next workday. So what can you do if you have workaholic tendencies like me? Build friction.
2. Build friction
During your off-time, you want to raise a wall between your leisure and your tasks. Obviously, this starts by making it difficult to check your mail. But more importantly, your should remove visual cues so your environment doesn’t constantly remind you of work.
For example:
- Log out of all programs and platforms at the end of your workday. Use a different browser that doesn’t have all your work-related bookmarks.
- Shut down your laptop and hide it in a different room, put it in the trunk of your car, or leave it at the office.
- Delete work-related apps from your phone — either for good or just for the time you want to detach.
I achieved the best results when I embedded these steps into my after-work ritual.
3. Close the Stress Cycle
The reason you keep feeling stressed after work is the “stress response cycle.” Evolutionarily, the cycle is supposed to go like this:
- Trigger: You spot a lion.
- Reaction: Your heart rate quickens, muscles tighten, and adrenaline and cortisol surge your bloodstream.
- Resolution: You run away and find safety with your tribe (or the lion eats you for dinner).
In the modern world, we don’t have to cope with lions anymore. But stress triggers are all around us — email avalanches, financial anxiety, social injustices, raging pandemics, polarizing news broadcasts, etc.
What’s worse, we’re not forced to cope with our threats anymore. We might not even recognize them as such because we feel physically safe. As a result, we often get stuck in the stage of anxiety.
And that’s how burnout creeps in.
We need to remember to complete the cycle when we’re stressed. And luckily, we don’t have to run away from lions to achieve that. Here are four simple ways:
- Exercise — go for a jog, hit the gym, do some yoga, or dance to your favorite jam. This can be anything that engages your muscles and your heart rate.
- Seek safety — Hug a friend or family member for 20+ seconds to release the “cuddle hormone” oxytocin. Or share your worries with a loved one. Or laugh. Or cry. All these emotional outlets signal relief and safety.
- Express yourself — Like exercise and safety, creating art provides space to let your thoughts emerge and escape. This includes but is not limited to painting, writing, or making music.
- Rest — Sleeping or napping are highly restorative activities. That said, if you find yourself in bed with racing thoughts, get up and ruminate in a different place. Perhaps sit down at the kitchen table and write in your journal. Separate spaces are important.
4. Separate Your Spaces
The Division of Sleep Medicine at Harvard suggests you shouldn’t work in your bedroom. Why? Because your brain will confuse work and sleep. As a result, you’ll find it harder to fall asleep — and you’ll feel tired when you work in bed.
Your mind needs a separation of activities and areas.
If you live in a one-room apartment like me, find other places. I write in a co-working space, meditate in the park, and read in cafés.
Of course, there will be times when you need to deviate from your separated spaces. But that’s completely normal. What counts is the long-term intention so your brain can catch the right cues.
5. Go Forest Bathing
Shinrin-Yoku is a Japanese therapy that surfaced in the 1980s. The English translation is “forest bathing,” and it’s just that — you visit a green space and use all five senses to plunge into nature.
It only takes a few minutes of Shinrin-Yoku to trigger tangible benefits such as reduced stress and enhanced focus. Further positive effects include an improved immune system and even higher creativity.
A typical forest bath may look like this:
- Switch off your phone and leave it switched off during your forest bath.
- Go into the greenest and most natural region you can find near you.
- Wander around aimlessly or sit down in a peaceful place.
- Engage all your senses — observe, listen, smell, and feel. You can even engage your taste buds by bringing some tea or chewing on verified (!) edible herbs.
6. Don’t Escape, Play
In his book Rest, Alex Pang suggests “deep play” to relax and recharge after work. Deep play can be any activity that resembles the core elements of your work while lowering the downsides.
The benefits? Deep play…
- reminds us why we’re passionate about our work,
- offers much quicker rewards than the actual work,
- and helps us discover new angles for the problems we’re solving.
I like to take my time to cook a nutritious meal after writing. Like writing, cooking requires creativity, focus, and sleight of hand — but in a completely different way. Plus, the reward is fairly immediate and highly satisfying.
7. How to Set Boundaries and Say No
Lastly, it’s crucial to set boundaries. Your colleagues and clients must respect your working hours and your need for rest. Embrace saying no. Because every no is actually a yes for a less stressful life.
When saying no, be assertive. You don’t need to give reasons for your no, but it’ll make you more convincing by helping others understand your point of view. Whatever happens, don’t let anyone sweet talk you into changing your mind.
Here’s my favorite way to construct a no, based on a conversation between Tim Ferriss and Elizabeth Gilbert:
- Start with “Thank you for [whatever it is they’re asking for].”
- Follow that up with something like, “and no” or, “unfortunately, I’ll have to pass.” (Avoid saying “but” because it’s kind of a cruel word.)
- If they try to beg or convince you, validate their feelings. Say something like, “I understand,” “you might be right about that,” or “I see that.” Keep adding a “no” to everything you say.
You Are the Worker, Not the Work
If there’s only one thing you take away from this article, it should be this:
You are not your job.
The work you do is an artifact of your personality, opinions, and behaviors at a certain point in time. But these traits change over time. That’s why you don’t even recognize the things you created years ago.
In other words, you are the worker. But never the work.
To remind yourself of that simple truth, turn to these seven strategies:
- Build pre-work and after-work rituals to fence in your working hours.
- Create friction between you and your work to prevent workaholic relapses during leisure.
- When feeling stressed or anxious, complete the cycle by exercising, seeking safety with loved ones, creating art, or resting.
- Separate your physical spaces to signal your boundaries between work and leisure.
- Turn off your devices and engage all your senses in a “forest bath.”
- Discover your deep play — a passion that resembles core elements of your work but offers quicker rewards.
- Learn to say no by being assertive and concise.