I’m going to miss you, but I am taking a sabbatical

Older videos are naturally downranked because users want fresh content. The age of a post is a strong predictor of user interaction. However, it doesn't mean Youtube actively punishes less frequent creators. YouTube actually promotes a lot of old content (>1 year old) compared to other platforms. At the extreme, Instagram Stories are deleted after 24 hours forcing you to produce content daily.

Perhaps it depends on what kind of content creator we are talking about. Is it the shock and awe / latest greatest / hype train type of content?

One thing I don't feel is that these sabbaticals have necessarily been some kind of radical life-altering experience. I pretty much just did the same stuff that I enjoyed doing anyway, but I did it entirely at my own pace, with zero pressure or stress. I'm not really seeking enlightment, I'm just seeking peacefulness.

As I am getting older, I am thinking that perhaps instead of doing my usual 1-2 years at a couple of different companies and then breaking, it might be nicer to have a consistent job that would allow me to break and come back. I have returned to two companies in my employment history - one after spending a year overseas, and another that I returned to part-time as a remote freelancer during COVID. Unfortunately I don't think many companies are inclined to offer this as a formal benefit, especially in countries where months-long parental leave isn't a thing. I suppose people who enjoy these kinds of sabbaticals and come back refreshed and hopefully more productive are still enough of a minority that it isn't seen as something that would be in a company's interest to promote.

After the last, I started a new job full time for about a year, after which I transitioned to working just Monday - Wednesday (8 hour days). I'm in year 4 of this schedule. For me, I think this works better than full time and occasional sabbaticals. I have not approached anything near burn out.

There's a sliding scale here. Few are wealthy enough that they don't need income forever. But many can save up enough to take a few weeks or a few months off. More like a long unpaid vacation.

You just need to be disciplined.

⸻ 1. I also put half of any “extra” income that comes my way and if I slide money that I don’t use into that fund as well.

I hope this post will inspire also me somehow.

But in the meantime - I hope you'll beat it fast.

Something about “not feeling the need to be validated by work” sounds appealing and is bubbling in my mind recently, but I’m not sure how that looks day to day.

What do you mean by this? I saw the announcement in my RSS reader before seeing it here.

> What are your other favorites that might help me fill the gap?

I actually just purged a lot of my media consumption for "burnout" related reasons of my own, but can second some of the recommendations Jason included at the end of the post like Colossal and Open Culture. He also posted this a couple years back:

https://kottke.org/18/04/blogging-is-most-certainly-not-dead

Firstly, I believe you underestimate the amount of work Jason does and the amount of stress he is under.

I've read Kottke.org since I was a kid, and it's the only blog I still regularly read. There's a reason it's the only website I've looked at everyday for the majority of my life: consistent excellence. Anecdotally, whenever Jason has a guest writer come on his blog, I can tell before I even read the by-line. It's just not the same quality.

And that doesn't happen for free. I imagine it takes a huge amount of work and thought to successfully curate The Whole Internet into something that people actually want to read for 24 years. Remember that his livelihood depends directly on driving traffic to his website — there's no safety net or wiggle room. This sounds incredibly stressful to me.

Secondly, in another comment you claim that because other people with different jobs might be burnt out from those jobs, it is not reasonable for Jason to feel burnt out from his job, and therefore his sabbatical is unwarranted.

This makes no sense. Anyone can get burnt out from any job, and if they have the privilege to do so (and I do agree with you that it is a privilege), they should take time off. In a similar vein, if someone suffers from depression, that person should seek therapy if they can, regardless of whether someone else has life circumstances that are worse.

It makes no sense to prevent someone from taking time off (or seeking therapy) just because their life isn't as bad as someone else's. Instead, we should advocate for better working conditions (or access to therapy) for those who cannot afford the privilege.

It's also clear that Jason has other things going on in life and wanting to clear your plate and reset is very human and understandable.

It's not the surfing and posting links. It's the knowing if I don't surf and post sufficiently interesting links every day, I can't afford my health insurance. The stakes are much higher in the latter.