Take Your Lunch Break; Everyone Will Thank You For It

I dunno, is it just me or is it gross to eat at your desk?

Something about electronics and getting crumbs in the keyboard… and yet, we all do it. I do it too.

I know I’m not unique to this plight, and it’s not unique to anyone’s experience either working from home or in an actual office. We bring our lunches to work to save money or try to eat healthy, and we save our “break” to hustle to do something else (run errands, argue on the phone with Duke Energy, or we don’t take the break at all so we can leave work earlier).

The past few months, as my business and personal priorities have shifted, I found that I needed to really take a lunch break. Sure, I could do back to back to back calls and schedule meetings later in the day since I’m not a morning person. But I wasn’t scheduling a lunch break in the middle of the day. And was this actually benefiting anyone, especially me?

So I began to schedule a true lunch break. Just as I do my best to be at my desk ready to go at 9AM (as if I am reporting to an actual boss [myself]), I have begun scheduling one hour lunch breaks in the middle of the day. This is the time I workout, walk the dog, run errands and eat lunch. Even sit and watch an episode of “The Office” on Netflix. My brain could use the 20 minute break.

I was lamenting to a friend the other evening that I have been “slacking” at the office, scheduling yoga in the middle of my work day and it felt weird. I should be hustling 24/7 shouldn’t I? That’s what I did all last year. Also what happened last year: I had 2 massive migraines that sent me to bed for 2 days straight with nausea and vomiting, and I had a handful of panic attacks that were greater than the sum I had had in my life up to that point. So… not exactly a “successful mental health” year. And the reasons were as plain as day: I wasn’t taking care of myself.

She reminded me of this and said, “You are taking care of your business if you are taking care of yourself. Your clients feel a difference when you go to yoga, or walk Max. When you take care of yourself, everyone around you benefits.”

She’s right. We cannot fill others cups if we do not fill our own, and especially when you are an entrepreneur where everyone (it feels like everyone some days) is trying to get something from you (time, free advice, etc…).

Take your lunch break. And REALLY take it. Everyone around will you be grateful.

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