2022-12-08
48 分钟I have to get really clear about what I'm doing and why.
I'd give an early lip service to the idea of a creative sabbatical in the early days.
I just called it my writing retreat.
A month long writing retreat.
And then I started to realize that I actually wanted it to be something different, and I needed to figure out what I wanted to do with this time.
Knowing that I had no idea if I would ever be able to do something like this again.
And I didn't want to waste it.
Hey there.
So today is a little bit of a different episode for you.
And as I sit here recording this, I have just returned from a one month creative sabbatical.
And we'll go into exactly what I mean by that, which is something I never believed would be possible for someone like me until something happened earlier this year that inspired me to really test that assumption and eventually prove me wildly wrong.
And I'm coming back with some experiences, some awakenings, some reality checks and learnings that I wanted to share with you today.
Because if you've ever thought about taking anywhere from a month to a season or even a year off, I thought maybe my lived experience while simultaneously running two companies, hosting two podcasts, producing three episodes a week, building additional product lines and streams experiences, generating a ton of added content across multiple platforms, working with a team that literally spans the entire globe, and pushing to constantly hit deliverable deadlines, and often being at the center and the main bottleneck of everything, that if I could do that after thinking there's just no way that I'd ever be able to not only justify it, but on a practical level, take a month to step away and focus entirely on creative projects that I've sidelined for years, then maybe what I've learned in this experience just might be helpful.
And the funny thing is that this entire thing was actually kicked off by a conversation that happened earlier in the year that changed everything and led me into a month away, that shook my world in so many ways, today, we're going to dive into just what happened, what I learned, and how you might consider creating your own version of an extended, deeply generative, regenerating, renewing and awakening leap.
So excited to share these experiences and insights with you.
I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is good life project.
Okay, so I was thinking about how to set this up, this creative sabbatical debrief episode.
And I'm going to walk you through it in different stages, and we're going to start with what I call the setup.
So I'll take you back to earlier this year.
I'm sitting down in conversation with a dear friend of mine, Jenny Blake, and we're recording this conversation for the Good Life Project podcast at the time.