The Most Productive Thing I Did This Month Was Stop Working

A few weeks ago, I was depleted.

Not the intense, hit-the-wall burnout that many of my readers and clients are experiencing. This was quieter than that. More like a slow dimming – the kind that creeps in when you've been pushing a little too hard for a little too long.

As a burnout recovery coach, I'll be honest: there was something quite humbling about recognizing the signs in myself. I know them well. I teach them.

And yet here they were, quietly gathering in my own life while I was busy working on a book – a book, ironically, about the very burnout epidemic I was beginning to create for myself.

The Question I Ask My Clients

I decided to coach myself through it.

I asked the question I often bring to sessions when someone is running on empty:

What could I do that would feel lighter and more accessible right now?

Within a few days, I started writing a children's book.

It's called Grandmother Maple. It's set in a forest clearing and follows the creatures that call it home – a story about interconnectedness, impermanence, and the gentle courage of acceptance.

Not entirely unlike the themes I explore in my coaching work, but the approach and initial intention were completely different.

Lighter. More playful. Judgment-free.

What Happened When I Stopped Pushing

Something unexpected happened in that shift.

Somewhere in the process of writing about a three-hundred-year-old maple tree, I reconnected with something I hadn't realized I'd lost: the joy of creating without an agenda. 

The pure pleasure of putting words together just to see what they'd become. Allowing a story to come to life through unfiltered imagination and a good pen.

And perhaps most surprising of all – within just two weeks of stepping away from the original book, I found myself returning to it with more clarity, more energy, and significantly better ideas than I'd had before.

The detour wasn't a delay. It was part of the work.

This is something researchers in the field of cognitive rest have been pointing to for years.

Psychologist Shelly Carson at Harvard found that creative breakthroughs are significantly more likely to occur after periods of incubation – when the mind is given space to wander rather than grind.

The brain doesn't stop working when we step away – it shifts into a different, often more generative mode.

Rest isn't the opposite of productivity. The truth is that it's the source of it.

The Pattern I See in Clients

The people I work with who are most resistant to rest – who feel guilty or irresponsible for stepping away from the hard thing – are almost always the ones who need it most.

This is partly because they misunderstand what rest is, assuming it only comes from sleep or – quite literally the opposite of rest – doomscrolling.

But when they finally give themselves permission to redirect their energy toward activities that genuinely light them up, they nearly always return to the original challenge as a more capable, more creative version of themselves.

This isn't about abandoning the hard work.

It's about recognizing that burnout doesn't just reduce your energy – it quietly narrows your thinking. And that the path back to your best work often runs directly through the thing that you were conviced was only a distraction.

A Question Worth Sitting With

If you've been grinding on something important – a project, a goal, a difficult conversation – and you've started to feel that familiar dimming, I'd invite you to ask yourself:

What's something that would feel lighter or more energizing right now?

Not instead of the hard thing. Just for a little while – just long enough to come back as more of yourself.

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Burnout recovery is at the heart of the work I do – and you don't have to wait until you've hit the wall to reach out. If you're noticing the early signs: depletion, diminished motivation, a creativity that's gone quiet — I'd love to connect. Schedule a session today.