What to Do During a Career Break (Beyond Just Resting)

The hardest part of a career break isn't taking it—it's figuring out what to do with it once you have it.

You spend months or years dreaming about having time off. You imagine all the things you'll finally do: learn that skill, start that project, read those books, fix your sleep schedule, figure out what you actually want from your career.

Then the first week arrives and you sleep until noon, binge-watch TV, scroll through your phone, and feel vaguely guilty about wasting this precious time you fought so hard to get.

I've taken two career breaks. The first one, I had no plan and spent most of it anxious about not being productive enough. The second one, I over-planned and turned it into an unpaid full-time job of self-improvement that left me more exhausted than my actual job had.

What I learned is this: a career break works best when it has just enough structure to feel purposeful and just enough space to allow actual rest. Too little structure and you drift. Too much and you burn out trying to optimize time off.

Here's what actually helps.

The First Two Weeks: Just Rest

If you're coming off a period of intense work or burnout, do not jump immediately into productive activities. Give yourself at least two weeks—ideally a month—to decompress completely.

Sleep as much as you want. Watch TV guilt-free. Do nothing. Let yourself be bored. Your body and brain need this recovery time more than you probably realize.

When you're chronically stressed or overworked, your nervous system stays in high-alert mode even after the stressor ends. It takes time for your body to register that the threat is gone and it's safe to relax.

During my first career break, I felt like I should be "making progress" from day one. I tried to start projects, learn new things, be productive. I couldn't focus. Everything felt like effort. I thought something was wrong with me.

Nothing was wrong. I was just exhausted and needed rest, not another to-do list. Once I stopped fighting it and just rested for a few weeks, my energy and motivation returned naturally.

Don't rush this phase. You'll know when you're ready to do more because you'll actually want to, not because you think you should.

Clarify What You Want From This Time

Once you've rested enough to think clearly, it helps to get specific about what you actually want from this career break. Not what sounds impressive or what other people think you should do—what you genuinely want.

Some people want to explore a potential career change. Others want to build skills. Some just need extended recovery time. Some want to tackle personal projects they've been putting off for years. All of these are valid.

Write down your answer to this question: "In three months (or six months, or however long your break is), what would make me feel like this time was well-spent?"

Be honest. If your answer is "I slept well, felt relaxed, and figured out what kind of work I actually want to do," that's perfectly legitimate. If it's "I learned to code and built three portfolio projects," that's also fine. Just make sure it's your answer, not someone else's expectations.

Create Loose Structure (Not a Rigid Schedule)

Complete freedom sounds appealing but often leads to drift and anxiety. Some structure helps—but not the kind of structure you had at work.

Instead of hour-by-hour schedules, think in terms of weekly themes or general rhythms. Something like: "Mondays and Wednesdays I work on learning X. Tuesdays I do informational interviews or networking. Thursdays and Fridays are flexible for whatever I feel like doing."

The structure should serve you, not constrain you. If you wake up on a "learning day" and feel like taking a walk instead, take the walk. The point is to have a general framework that prevents aimless drifting without turning your break into another job.

One useful approach: set 2-3 weekly goals rather than daily to-do lists. Something like "have two conversations with people in different fields" or "make progress on that side project" or "read one book related to career interests."

This gives you direction without making every day feel like a performance evaluation.

Explore Without Committing

If you're using this time to figure out what you want to do next, resist the urge to make big commitments right away. A career break is for exploration, not immediate answers.

Try things in low-stakes ways. If you're curious about a different field, take a short online course or do a small project, don't enroll in a year-long program. If you think you might want to freelance, take on one small client, don't quit and launch a full business.

Talk to people doing the work you're curious about. Ask what they actually do day-to-day, not just what the job title sounds like. Most people are surprisingly willing to have 20-minute coffee chats if you're genuinely curious and respectful of their time.

I spent part of one career break doing informational interviews with people in adjacent fields. Some conversations confirmed that I wasn't interested in that path. Others opened up possibilities I hadn't considered. All of them gave me better information than just researching online would have.

The goal isn't to make a perfect decision. It's to gather enough information that your next choice feels more informed than your last one.

Build Skills Strategically

If you're using this time to learn something new, be strategic about what you choose. Not everything worth learning is worth learning right now.

Prioritize skills that either: (1) directly relate to career paths you're seriously considering, (2) fill clear gaps in your existing skill set, or (3) you're genuinely excited about regardless of career relevance.

Avoid learning things just because they sound impressive or because someone said you should. Learning a programming language you'll never use, or a design tool irrelevant to your field, or business skills that don't match your actual work—these feel productive in the moment but rarely pay off.

Also be realistic about depth versus breadth. Three months of focused work on one skill is usually more valuable than dabbling in five different things. You can always learn more later, but having one genuinely solid new skill is better than surface knowledge of many.

Maintain Some Social Connection

Career breaks can get isolating, especially if you're used to workplace interaction. You lose the default social structure that work provides—regular contact with colleagues, small talk during breaks, shared purpose and problems.

Without intentional effort, you can go days or weeks barely talking to anyone, which is fine for some people but draining for others.

Build in regular social touchpoints. Coffee with friends. Coworking at a library or cafe. Online communities related to what you're learning. Networking conversations with people in fields you're exploring. Volunteer work if that appeals to you.

It doesn't have to be daily or even frequent—just enough that you don't feel completely disconnected from other humans.

I underestimated this during my first break. I'm fairly introverted and thought I'd love the solitude. Turns out even introverts need some regular human interaction. By month three I was feeling isolated in ways I hadn't anticipated.

Track Progress Without Obsessing

Some people benefit from tracking what they're doing during a career break—it helps them see progress and stay motivated. Others find tracking stressful and prefer to just go with the flow.

If you do track, keep it simple. A weekly journal entry noting what you did, what you learned, and how you're feeling is usually enough. You don't need detailed time logs or productivity metrics.

The point isn't to optimize every hour. It's to have a record you can look back on when you inevitably wonder "what did I actually accomplish during those months?" The answer might surprise you—most people do more than they give themselves credit for.

Manage the Anxiety (It Will Come)

Even when a career break was your choice and you planned for it financially, anxiety often shows up. Anxiety about running out of money. Anxiety about falling behind professionally. Anxiety about making the wrong choice about what comes next.

This is normal. It doesn't mean you made a mistake by taking time off. It just means you're human and uncertainty is uncomfortable.

A few things that help: having a financial plan so you know exactly how long you can afford to be off work, setting a rough timeline for when you'll start job searching (even if that timeline is flexible), and reminding yourself that career gaps are increasingly common and increasingly acceptable.

Also, limit your exposure to LinkedIn and other professional social media if it makes you feel anxious. Everyone else's carefully curated highlight reel of productivity and success isn't useful comparison material when you're intentionally stepping back.

The anxiety will ebb and flow. Some days it'll be quiet. Some days it'll be loud. Both are normal parts of the process.

Plan Your Re-Entry (But Not Too Early)

At some point, your break will end. Either you'll run out of money, or you'll get a job offer, or you'll just feel ready to work again. Knowing roughly when and how you'll transition back helps reduce anxiety.

If your break has a defined end date (like a sabbatical with guaranteed return), you know when you're going back. If it's open-ended, set some markers—maybe when savings hit a certain threshold, or after a specific number of months, or when you've accomplished certain goals.

Plan to start your job search 2-3 months before you actually need a new job. The search process takes longer than most people expect, and having that buffer reduces pressure.

But don't spend your entire break anxiously preparing for re-entry. The first few months should actually be about the break itself. Only toward the end should you shift into transition mode.

What Not to Do

A few things that tend to make career breaks less effective:

Don't try to be productive every single day. Some days you'll do nothing and that's fine. Progress isn't linear and neither is motivation.

Don't compare your break to other people's. Someone else's three-month coding bootcamp sprint isn't better or worse than your three months of recovering from burnout while exploring options. Different people need different things.

Don't avoid all structure out of rebellion against work. Some people overcorrect from rigid work schedules to complete chaos and end up feeling aimless and anxious. You need some structure, just not the same kind you had before.

Don't feel guilty about enjoying yourself. If you're having fun, learning things you enjoy, spending time on hobbies, seeing friends—that's not frivolous. That's exactly what time off is for.

Don't make major life decisions in the first month. You're still decompressing and your judgment is probably affected by exhaustion. Give yourself time to settle before making big commitments.

Adjusting as You Go

What you need from a career break often changes as the break progresses. Maybe you thought you wanted to learn new skills but realize you mostly just need rest. Maybe you planned to rest but find yourself energized and wanting to build things.

That's fine. Adjust. The break is yours to shape—it doesn't have to follow some predetermined plan if that plan stops making sense.

Check in with yourself every few weeks. Is this still working? Am I getting what I need? Should I change my approach?

The only constant should be honesty with yourself about what's actually helping versus what you think should be helping.

Final Thoughts

A career break doesn't have to be transformative or perfectly productive or result in major life changes to be worthwhile. Sometimes the value is just in having had time to think, rest, and approach work with fresh perspective.

Maybe you'll come back to a similar role with better boundaries and clearer priorities. Maybe you'll switch careers entirely. Maybe you'll have learned something valuable but not immediately applicable. All of these outcomes are fine.

The point isn't to optimize every moment or achieve some idealized version of self-improvement. The point is to create space—space to recover, space to think, space to try things, space to just exist without the constant pressure of productivity and performance.

Most people don't regret taking a career break. They regret not taking one sooner, or not giving themselves permission to actually use the time in ways that felt right to them rather than ways that sounded impressive to others.

You have this time. Use it in whatever way serves you best.