The Story Of My Sabbatical Begins

In 2018, I started working full-time in a my first “real office job”.   That job marked the end a stint of travelling full time and being a content creator and digital nomad. 

I was a bit of afraid of what working in a normal job would do to me. I wondered if I would it would “suck my soul” or “chain me to a desk.” 

So I hatched an escape plan. I decided that I would start saving up for a sabbatical. In the Christian tradition, clergy get a sabbatical every 7 years. The idea is work 6 years, rest in the 7th. Sabbatical are based on the principle in the Old Testament principle of Jubilee in the Bible. The Israelites were to work their fields for 6 years and let the land rest on the 7th year. God would provide double in the 6th year so that no work was required on the 7th. Jubilee was about rest, but more importantly, trusting that God would provide. 

Since my parents are pastors and they get sabbaticals, I figured if I’m going to follow the same God, then I should get a sabbatical too. But since my job at that time wasn’t going to give it to me automatically, I would start saving up to take time off in my 7th year of working. 

And all of that planning, hoping and wishing has come to fruition now. My first sabbatical.

I had originally planned to travel for a full year, but some other interesting things came up, which I’ll share another day. For now, I’m about halfway through the travelling portion of my sabbatical and can really feel its effects now. 

My creativity, my joy for being alive, my belief in a good future is being deeply replenished in a way that I only hoped for. The funny thing about refilling your soul is that you can’t force it. You can only create space for it, set yourself as best as possible and wait. 

I started writing about sabbaticals last fall. A little but of a how-to guide, a bit of my personal journey prepping for it emotionally, mentally and financially, and some philosophical musings and spiritual reflections on sabbaticals.  Eventually, I hope to also share my lived experience of taking extended time off work and the after-effects of taking a sabbatical. 

I’m only just beginning to crack open my old writing files and see what I wrote months ago. I hope to share more of that on my blog in the coming weeks and months.  Sabbatical are sacred and beautiful and I hope to make several more in my lifetime. 

Life is so much more than work. 

On this sabbatical, I needed to rediscover who I am as a human, not an employee, worker, content creator or any of my other functions.  I wanted to find that feeling of being grateful that I am alive again not slogging through my relentless to-do list.  

I also sensed that I needed this trip to receive seeds of wisdom, things I would need for the rest of my 30’s and the next era of my life. 

We shall what emerges. :)

Infinite Love,

Anita