Don't Forget The Downtime

October 20, 2008

I’m a bit of a workaholic. Unfortunately this state is easy to achieve since I work from home and my work is also one of my passions. It’s all too easy to start playing around with a new idea or some new code and forget about the rest of my life. Since code is both part of my work and non-work life and also because my office is also my home, it is always tough to maintain boundaries. An experience this weekend reminded me again why we shouldn’t forget to have some downtime.

I wasn’t working on anything particularly exciting, but I had run into a frustrating problem. Whether it be something not compiling, something failing to run, or just strange computer problems, we’ve all been in this situation. I was making no progress towards a solution and spending way too much time trying.

My son provided me with a forced break; he was hungry. A 9 month old baby is not normally the best communicator, but there is no mistaking a hungry Jasper. I put him in his high chair, put on his bib, and prepared his lunch. Not 5 minutes into this ritual, which I quite enjoy, the answer to my frustrating problem popped into my head. Once Jasper was done eating and I returned to my work, it took me only a few seconds to confirm that answer was correct.

I thought being a father would mean some reduction in my output, whatever that happens to be at the time. This was the tradeoff I was happy to make. Surprisingly I’ve found that the forced breaks have made me a lot more productive. During play time, feedings, and night wake ups, I often get interesting ideas or think of creative solutions to problems.

Many people advocate downtime, but it was hard for me to put it into practice on my own. Thanks to my son, I don’t really have a choice anymore, and now that I’ve experienced the benefits, I’m a convert.

Downtime can’t just be periodic breaks during the day, though. I find that I need mental downtime between projects or after particularly busy periods.

When I start a new project, I tend to spend a while experimenting and exploring. Sometimes this is exploration of a related problem space, and sometimes it is just exploring weird things just for the fun of it. A lot of times I will go learn a new language or play with tools and protocols I’ve heard about somewhere.

If I’ve had a busy week and my brain needs a break, I’ll stock up on movies or video games and spend a few days immersed in someone else’s creative endeavors. This works wonders for me, and by the end I’m usually excited to jump back into work.

This is probably standard practice for some, but for those of you like myself, don’t forget to take some downtime. Your brain, and probably your family and friends, will thank you.

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