Hey, Creator: In praise of hiatuses (a mid-break update)

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Hi, friend. Long time, no talk. Just a quick mid-hiatus update…

First up, our Hey Creator podcast producer, Kelton, finally persevered in getting me to do a post-mortem of our first season, which you can listen to here.

Second, I just got back from a trip and wrote this:

“We were on a break!” Ross insisted once on the perennially overrated sitcom “Friends.”

Yes, I said it. “Friends” is overrated. It had maybe two or three solid seasons, stole its structure from a less popular show, and coasted on its laurels for far too long. (I mean, did any of us end up liking Ross by the end?) But before it kind of petered out, the show did deliver some decent performances, among them the episode in which Ross and Rachel take a break and he sleeps with the girl with the lip ring he met in the laundry room, forever dooming his chances of reconciling with his one, potentially true love.

It seems there are no rules on a break—or are there?

Breaks, it seem, can be catastrophic, as in the case of our hapless romantic Ross. Or take King David from the Bible, who commits adultery with Bathsheba (which is usually a no-no in the Old Testament) at a time when kings are supposed to go off to war. Instead, he stays home and causes a whole bunch of drama. Not to mention the Roman Empire, which was quite lax in defending itself in its latter years—taking a break, as it were, from the whole “conquering the world” thing. We all know how that ended.

And yet, sometimes a break can be beautiful. For example, I traveled back to Nashville from Alberta last week, and somehow had a layover in Los Angeles. Now, I love L.A., but the airport can be a bit crazy. Never have I ever spent more time in a security line than at LAX. Nonetheless, the town itself exudes possibility. Where else do you get mountains and beaches and movie stars all in the same day? Despite the traffic and the smog and some Californian pretentiousness (you know it’s true), it’s just so damn charming.

Anyway, I had three hours in L.A. and a choice to make:

I could spend those few hours in a fancy airport lounge catching up on work—well, more likely typing on my laptop in a food court outside the newly rebranded Kentucky Fried Chicken...

...or I could call an Uber and make my way towards water, hopefully in time to catch the sunset.

It was no contest. I called the car.

The woman who picked me up was Salvadoran, and we spent the drive to the nearest beach speaking Spanish, talking about our travels. She recommended a particular monastery outside of Barcelona that I had to visit, gave me her card, and told me to call whenever I was back in town.

Fifteen minutes later, I was walking on the beach, FaceTiming my lady, grinning from ear to ear. This particular beach wasn’t anything special. It was near an RV park and seemed to be the sort of middle class-type beach where you’d take your kids on a long cross-country jaunt. The kind of place Chevy Chase would bring his kids to in the eighties, dressed in jogging shorts and a goody hat or something. Half of me was tempted to rent a bike and head to where the action was, while another, truer part of me felt a tug to slow down, take off my shoes, and enjoy where I was.

Once again, I did the latter. And it made all the difference. I kicked off my shoes, took too many photos, and watched the sun disappear into the western horizon, leaving a halo across the sky that I can still see. Not quite thirty minutes after arriving, I called another car, met him at the beach entrance, and told him all about my little adventure. Mauricio, who manages a Buffalo Wild Wings in West Covina which you really must check out, said to me, “Let me get this straight. You landed at LAX, had a layover, and took a drive out to the beach just to see the sunset?“

Exactly, I said.

“Nobody does that!”

Well, I did.

I learned a long time ago that a break is not something to squander. A layover is never just a layover. Once, when traveling back from the Philippines, I had something like a seven-hour break between flights, and found myself wandering the Hong Kong airport, itself another country. After about an hour of deliberating, I decided to accept my friends’ invitation to join them for a few hours on the island and maybe try to see that famous Buddha statue.

Only there was just one problem: I couldn’t.

Unbeknownst to me, I had somehow already gone through the security systems that now made it impossible to leave the airport. How did I know this checkpoint and that conveyor belt meant I was committing my afternoon and evening to what basically turned out to be a very large shopping mall? But that’s what happened. And despite my many attempts to flee this part of the airport, I could find no exits and no empathetic airport employees. Frankly, I blame communism. ;)

I felt foolish and disappointed, and I regretted that for a very long time. It was my indecision that did me in, my vacillating between what I wanted and what seemed wise at the time. And this back-and-forth led to my doing nothing except staying put and feeling terrible about it.

Never again, I vowed on that day. Never again would I miss a chance to experience another culture, try a new thing, see an old sight. I wouldn’t miss what I wanted because I was simply afraid. Not again.

And so, when it came time to lay over in L.A., it really was not choice. Sure, I questioned myself and wondered if I had enough time. When I walked past the very long security line on my way towards the exit, I felt a bit nervous. But I kept walking, with the knowledge I could always turn back. I could always walk away if the stakes were too high. But I knew I’d regret not trying.

And so, as melodramatic as that sounds, I think that’s what a break is for. Not to stay put and do what everyone else is doing. But to use the pause as a means of propelling you towards what you really want—a welcome opportunity, as it were. I think many of us are living now in the aftermath of such choices. A world that is edging its way ever so slowly towards “post-pandemic,” we are now facing the reality of what we did with this time. Is it a Hong Kong situation or an L.A. layover? What you do doesn’t matter to me, so long as it’s what you want and not simply what you think is available to you.

These last several months since “retiring” a decade’s worth of work, I’ve been enjoying my “time off” from running a personal brand. It’s been fun to not have to be “on” or feel like I have to sell myself constantly. And in the background, I’ve been watching the world, sometimes feeling jaded but more often just plain amused, quietly growing a writing/editing agency and learning a new way of being in the world. One where I can be me and not simply a character on the internet.

It’s been nice.

My team and I have big plans for 2022: new projects we want to launch, new work we want to share with you, and who knows what else. What I’ve learned from my life, especially these past few years of what I would now call an unfolding, is that the best stories don’t go exactly the way you expect.

And in regards to this thing called a hiatus: well, I highly recommend it. If you can swing it, your world might be a little better if you recede from it even for a short while. It might feel nice to let go of what you thought you were—who knows what you may become? And at worst, you could always just turn around and walk right back through security.

I know some of you wondered and worried about my “retirement.” Where would I go? What would I do? But taking a break, in my experience, doesn’t mean an end. It means the thing you want to do and the attention you have to give it do not currently match. It means sometimes leaving the airport—or the marriage or the job or the whatever—without knowing exactly what will happen. Because you must. Because you couldn’t forgive yourself otherwise. You have to at least try.

I don’t say these words lightly. There is great potential cost in leaving that secure terminal. You might miss your flight entirely. (I’ve done that, too.) You might regret the whole thing. But only you can know that.

So. Hello from the other side. Some of you are coming back from a brief holiday break. Some of you desperately need one. Some of you might be returning from the beach. Whatever the case, I hope you are well and learning to use your time as best you can. I am trying to do the same.

Best,

Jeff

P.S. Behind the scenes, I’ve been working with a wonderful team of geniuses to produce big-idea books that we hope make the world a little bit better. Here’s some of our recent work, and a few interviews I’ve done that describe what we are building together (more on this in the New Year):

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