Tips for Planning a Sabbatical
Cefalú, Sicily, Italy
How I Planned My Italy Sabbatical
After eight years with my creative agency, building it up from a small team to one that regularly wins awards, somehow surviving four election cycles (we work in politics), countless wins and setbacks, hundreds of contracts and clients and projects, I was fairly burnt out. In fact, I distinctly remember a moment in 2021 when I said, “I am whatever comes past burnt out.” With a lot of support from my team, I was fortunately able to take two months off this past Spring to reset and recharge.
With swarms of workers quitting or quiet-quitting over the past few years, burn-out increasing, and employee engagement declining, the number of employers offering sabbaticals has been on the rise. If you are employed at one of the 16% of companies that offer a paid or unpaid sabbatical, taking extended time off can be a transformational experience. It can also be stressful to plan. While I was tremendously worried that I wouldn’t “make the most” of my sabbatical, I am happy to report that my time off vastly exceeded expectations and was truly life-changing.
Here are some of my recommendations for planning your sabbatical:
Reflect on what you hope to get out of the time off.
This is different for everyone. Start with the big question: what is your reason for taking this sabbatical? Yes, you are likely burnt out, but beyond that, what would bring you more joy, purpose, and passion at this moment in your life? For my own planning, I spent some time reflecting on what I was hoping to change about my life and what was blocking me at the time.
Set some goals.
Reflecting on the larger purpose for your sabbatical can help guide your decisions and ensure your sabbatical is meaningful and rewarding. With this in mind, you can start to ask yourself what goals you have for this time.
Are you looking for personal growth? Developing new professional skills or sharpening some you have? Focusing on creative interests or passion projects? Travel experiences? Volunteering? Time with family? Focusing on your health? Or something else?
These goals will help narrow in on the types of activities you might want to do during your time off that contribute toward your over-arching needs and purpose. I recommend limiting yourself to 1-5 goals max, so that you don’t overdo it or set unrealistic expectations for yourself. Even if all you want to do with your sabbatical is go lay on a beach somewhere for a few weeks and not be responsible for anything or anyone, you could set your goal as: “relax & reduce responsibilities.”
The goals for my sabbatical were focused on the areas of: identity, reflection, and creativity.
Create a list of things you’ve fantasized about doing with more time off of work.
I spent at least a month jotting down ideas in a notes doc on my phone, regularly adding all of the things I’d like to do with more time off. I found inspiration in movies, TV shows, things I read, conversations with friends, things I saw on social media, really anything that seemed to grab my attention. Set no boundaries on this exercise, just write down anything that comes to mind without self-judgment. A sample of the many many things I had on my list include:
Spend a semester learning different pasta-making techniques at a culinary school in Rome.
Move to Buenos Aires for a month with no real plans.
For the very first time, visit the town my father’s family is from in Southern Italy.
Work on obtaining my dual Italian citizenship.
Learn a new language.
Go on an extremely long walk every day.
Travel around the globe and stop in at least one country in at least 6 continents.
Visit Antarctica.
Volunteer as a guide at a local outdoor art/sculpture museum.
Slow travel somewhere where I can spend at least a week at a time in one location.
Enroll in a weaving course in the Hudson Valley.
Write a book.
Focus on strength training and be able to lift heavy things again.
Book myself an epically over-the-top treatment at a luxury spa somewhere very far away.
Lay in a hammock in silence for as long as I can (I was pretty tired the day I wrote this one)
Spend multiple days in a row just sitting at a cafe reading romance novels.
Learn a new craft like woodwork or leatherwork.
Challenge myself to create art daily.
etc, etc, etc
The list kept going. For each item I listed out, I then took a step back to look at how it compared to the goals I set for my sabbatical and what was sparking the most joy. It quickly became clear to me that I was gravitating toward a lengthy trip to Italy where I could line up many, but not all, of these ideas. From there, I started to do basic research on the time commitment, availability, and cost of some of the activities that I was most interested in.
Decide on your budget and timeline.
Whether the time during your sabbatical is paid by your employer or not, unless you are sitting at home, your sabbatical will likely incur some expenses. So while you might be feeling burnt out and ready for time off asap, I don’t recommend rushing into a sabbatical without doing some legwork to plan it first.
In planning your budget, consider how much you want to spend on activities during your time off (particularly if you are traveling). Factor in flights, hotels, activities and experiences, classes, health and travel insurance, food, transportation, miscellaneous expenses, and costs for any other activities you enjoy.
On the income side, you might be fortunate enough to have your time while on sabbatical paid by your employer. If not, or your sabbatical is in between jobs, depending on your situation, you may decide to explore short-term or part-time freelance opportunities to help bring in some income to pay for parts of your trip and still contribute to your long-term financial goals or current financial obligations.
Once you have your budget planned out, work backward to figure out how long it will take to save for your goal. If you are traveling, also consider what time of year is optimal for visiting your destination(s) (I love shoulder seasons myself).
Don’t put too much pressure on yourself.
Because it’s such a rare opportunity to take a sabbatical, it can be easy to slip into the mindset of putting pressure on yourself to “make the most of it” or compare yourself to others. You might desperately need the time off but not yet have the budget you’d like for an epic trip around the world, or you might have other obligations, responsibilities, or limitations that keep you close to home. You deserve time focused on you, so I truly hope you’re able to carve out some time for yourself, however that might look. But regardless, even if you decide to use your time off to just exist and live your life, that’s just as worthwhile, important, and valuable as planning a trip around the world. You get to decide what’s meaningful to you.
If you decide to travel, pick a destination.
If you are traveling during your sabbatical, you may immediately have a destination (or multiple) already in mind. If not, take a look through your activity list to see if there are any themes that emerge that can help you decide where to go. Since most people decide to plan their sabbatical as a solo adventure, another exercise that can be helpful in deciding on a destination for your trip is to write down the places that you’ve always wanted to visit but that have been of less interest to your usual travel companions (friends, family, partner, kids).
Book your trip and prep to sign off.
I’m obviously going to recommend working with a Travel Advisor to book your trip. We’ll get you the best deals, help make recommendations, and keep everything organized for you. For my own sabbatical, I organized everything in a simple spreadsheet with tabs for my budget/expense tracking; an itinerary with dates, notes, confirmation references, and links; and a running to-do list of things I needed to take care of before I left. I also added all key events to my personal calendar (my work calendar got deleted off my phone while I was out) with relevant addresses and notes — including check-in/out times, tours, trains, restaurant reservations, and other activities — so that it was easy to reference while traveling around. Lastly, I created a Google map for each destination with locations of things I booked and points of interest I came across in my research or were recommended to me by friends.
Because I’m A Planner and really wanted to unplug, I held back from booking as much in advance as I normally do. This was wonderful at times — it gave me the freedom to follow whatever sparked my interest in the moment — but also had a downside when things I really wanted to do got sold out. While I do recommend booking much less when you are on sabbatical or solo traveling, if there are a handful of things you’d really regret missing, definitely book those in advance.
At work, make sure you prep well in advance for coverage for your role while you are out, communicate your dates and coverage plan more times than you think is necessary so that the information is retained, organize any open action items and active projects for whoever will be stepping in, and close out any loose ends.
Stay connected (or not) and think about reintegration.
You’ll need to decide whether or not you want to stay connected with anyone at work while you are out. If you really want to fully unplug, I recommend not being available at all. There are also shades to those rules and you can decide what “exceptions” you want to establish and with whom. Whatever you decide, make sure it is extremely clear what the boundaries are and communicate those to everyone you normally work with. Once you’re officially off, throw up that “out of office” email responder, shut down your work computer, and delete any work-related applications from your phone.
While you are probably fantasizing about never working another day in your life, that’s probably not your reality. Spend some time thinking about how you want to reintegrate back into your “normal” life once your sabbatical is over. Because I was traveling alone, I decided it would be fun — and a good way to reintegrate back to normal — for my husband, and then a few friends, to meet up for the final leg of my trip (we had a blast in Sicily!). I also purposely came back to DC about a week before I had to go back to work so that I could attempt to get over the post-travel blues before my first day back online.
My time off actually inspired me to become a travel advisor with Fora, so I can’t wait to see what inspiration it brings you!
