Yesterday, I felt a leading to not do the regular stuff of my day.
Usually, I “tend” my blog, I water my facebook connections, I weed my emails, I fertilize my social media outlets. Not yesterday. I heard a still small voice say. “Don’t do it today.”
This seemed silly…. and counter-productive, counter-intuitive, and just plain “not what I wanted.” I dug in my heels a bit. I balked. I sighed just a little–kind of like a whine. And then I resign to it for the day. But it was good.
I didn’t have expectations. I had nothing to “put out there” for people to see or like. I didn’t have to try. And for more than several hours, I felt a different sort of restfulness than I have regarding writing.
I’m thinking about taking a sabbatical, of sorts.
Maybe unplugging. Perhaps a retreat.
Word Origin & History(1)
1645, “of or suitable for the Sabbath,” from L. sabbaticus, from Gk. sabbatikos “of the Sabbath” (see Sabbath). Meaning “a year’s absence granted to researchers” (originally one year in seven, to university professors) first recorded 1886 (the thing itself is attested from 1880, at Harvard), related to sabbatical year (1599) in Mosaic law, the seventh year, in which land was to remain untilled and debtors and slaves released.
Graduation is coming, and it would be a good fit.
What ideas do you have about sabbaticals, or how to best encounter them?
1. sabbatical. Dictionary.com. Online Etymology Dictionary. Douglas Harper, Historian.http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/sabbatical (accessed: April 21, 2010).