No, you’re not too busy to take a break for lunch

Let me rewind to my first HR manager job. Every day at noon, I’d make a trivial decision. Do I eat lunch in the lunchroom, or at my desk? My answer was always the same. I’d take my sad-looking salad back to my desk. I was far too busy and important to take 30 minutes for lunch, thank you very much.

For the next few years, I consistently ate lunch at my desk while smashing out emails and creating a disgusting mess of my keyboard. My habit of never stopping for lunch wasn’t a big deal. It was a little thing. But the little things usually point to bigger problems.

Having a sad desk salad? Try taking a real break instead.Credit: iStock

The problem wasn’t stopping for lunch. The problem was my incessant belief that I’m too busy to stop. And my belief didn’t stop there. I was also too busy to exercise, too busy for a social life, too busy to stop working. And so began my struggle with toxic productivity.

I started noticing myself doing daily productivity calculations. I counted minutes like we count kilojoules. Was every moment accounted for? Did I string out the maximum value from every single hour?

Looking back now, I can see that my productivity was less about optimisation and more about obsession. If I wasn’t capitalising on each minute, I was unproductive, lazy and not good enough. If I relaxed, I failed. If I switched off, I failed. If I didn’t “win the day” every day, I failed.

Fast-forward a few years to 2019, and my little lunch problems turned into big life problems. I didn’t listen to my body, and eventually, my body stopped for me.

Work has a crucial place in our lives. But if it’s the main driver of your self-worth, you’re putting yourself in a precarious position.

I was running a big meeting at work and started to feel a bit weird. By the end of it, I was feeling quite unwell and went home. I didn’t go back to work for three months.

I went through major burnout, and it was the worst experience of my working life. In that first month, I remember wondering if I’d ever be able to go back to work. I couldn’t get out of bed. I had no energy at all. I found basic tasks at home completely overwhelming.

Over those few months, I learned a painful lesson: toxic productivity is all fast-paced, but burnout is a slow burn.

It doesn’t happen overnight, but it can come out of left field. It has early warning signs, but they usually go unnoticed. It’s not “all of a sudden” — it builds up over time.

For me, the slow burn started with the skipped lunches, the daily productivity calculations, the obsession with proving myself, and the clincher: connecting my sense of self-worth with my work. The combination made for a pretty toxic relationship with productivity.

So, how can we unravel toxic productivity? Here’s what helps.

Remember your work is not your worth. Work has a crucial place in our lives. But if it’s the main driver of your self-worth, you’re putting yourself in a precarious position. Because when you have a career crisis, and we all do, your sense of value takes the hit, and it’s far more difficult to bounce back.

Build healthy boundaries. Your boundaries reflect what you value most. It’s easy to focus on short-term wins and say yes to everything. But your career is a long game. Learning how to set good boundaries is key to a sustainable and healthy career.

Start working out what you value most and use this to guide your career decision-making. Before taking on another new commitment, consider: if you say yes to that thing, what are you saying no to, and what is the cost to you personally?

Performing well and being well go hand in hand. Workplace wellbeing specialist Phil Wolffe says: “It’s crucial to learn how you personally recover best from challenging work, and build that into your daily routine.”

For some people, recovery might look like a daily walk; for others, it might look like heading to the beach. Rest might be reading a book or bingeing a TV series. But the most important part: learning to recover, rest and relax without the guilt.

Optimise, but don’t obsess. While we need to optimise our routine and productivity, look out for any signs of obsessing. Rumination and harsh self-criticism tend to be one of the early signs you’re obsessing instead of optimising your productivity. When we’re optimising, we’ll prioritise recovery and rest and relaxation, knowing that they are crucial for long-term performance and wellbeing.

Shelley Johnson is the founder of HR agency Boldside and hosts the podcast, this is work.

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