I have been working professionally since the middle of high school - 20+ years. Since then, I have not had a vacation longer than 2 weeks - and those I have started to take fairly regularly just around 5 years ago.
But I have never had a real (doesn't matter how long) sabbatical from work. I didn't even have this idea in my mind, that you can have a sabbatical (not vacation) until I listened to an interview by Tim Ferriss with Jerry Colonna - where the guest makes a great case for two/three month sabbatical (highly recommended listen).
Update:
Another Tim's guest Matt Mullenweg, makes a case for it, also pointing that Automattic has a sabbatical benefit.
I have decided to do it.
And here was my reasoning pre-sabbatical - since (if you are a workaholic), you need a good justification for that nuclear bomb heading your way:- I just need it - I owe it to myself for 20+ hard years of work. And if you run a company (or two, or seven 😂) you know that it's not typical work - it's 24/7.
- This will actually be good for business. We will test if all systems, policies, and people are in the right place, to have a sustainable business, and not have bus factor == 1 (meaning dependent on me).
- I just have a long overdue private to-do list, and that needs to be done someday, right? Right??? 😵
I've done it.
So here is a recap:The important stuff
We had a few days hike with my oldest son (which I've been promising for 2 years). It was just spectacular! Just that made me realize - why am I working for (whom).
Learned how to properly service a bike and built my own home bike service/shop.
Learned that bike-packing is a thing, and built my own setup, and did a lot! of solo bike rides.
Did a few day solo-hike in Saxon Switzerland (both Czech and German side).
Spent some time in Berlin, finally seeing Museum für Naturkunde Berlin and Computer Games Museum (highly recommended).
Did a few great bike trips with my friend (and one of teonite's partners) Kamil:
- Did a whole day meditation session and a few days just contemplating life =]
Projects rabbit hole
- Tested various blogging/static site generators and implemented this blog site with Zola & Custom Paper theme.
- Implemented in home & private office proper IoT VLANs with Homebridge for AppleHome devices.
- Did a lot of research about the security of various chat protocols (Telegram, Signal, …) and decided that my preference will be Matrix - and implemented my own Matrix server.
- Implemented my own mail server with mailcow - finally! I host my own private email.
- Migrated 100Gb+ mail from various Google Workspace/Gmail accounts into my own server (and Google workspace) - that for sure will be another blog post.
- Implemented a proper backup system with Restic (and Rustic) and ansible setup.
- Implemented a proper multiple YubiKeys setup, with cold storage of master keys.
- Tested a lot of pocket self-hosted alternatives and implemented my own Hoarder instance.
- Tested a lot of Google Analytics alternatives and implemented Plausible for my sites.
Reading
Finally caught up with my (Fresh)RSS feed - with some of my favorites - especially Derek Sivers, Bunny, Ma.tt. I've also discovered Andreas Klinger's blog with priceless advice about managing a team, investment, startups (and more!). A lot of what he's writing I have observed in my 20+ year career as a manager, investor, and product builder but a lot of insights were new to me - and pure gold! My goal is to read all those important blog posts at least once a month for some time until it will be in my "blood".
Standout book I've read: Derek Sivers - How to live.
Closing thoughts
I think this is one of the greatest gifts I’ve given myself. It gave me perspective, a lot of personal insights (as well as new ideas and perspectives towards business) but also made me appreciate everything I have, do and did up to this point - much, much more.
I was also very delighted to see that some of my peers did actually miss me 🤣 and to hear that it's good that I'm back 😍.