“You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means” ~ from the movie The Princess Bride.
In a recent post on LinkedIn, the author explained that she checks her work email every day while on vacation, and that doing so allows her to relax.
Others chimed in to say they take a similar approach. One person said, “I can’t imagine a total disconnect ever…”
Someone else said the opposite: “Nope. I did this for the first 10 years of practice. I never fully relaxed and recharged. For the past 23 years, I have fully unplugged … and come back recharged.”
So, there you have it. There are those who think they can only relax by taking some time out of every day of their vacation to be sure everything is okay back at the office, and others who believe you must fully disconnect to achieve true relaxation.
I am solidly with the crowd that believes you cannot truly relax unless you can put the office completely out of your mind. I say this while recognizing that it is impossible for some people to do that, and that attempting it will only drive them nutsier. (I say “nutsier” instead of “nuts” because it is clear to me that people who cannot relax without being on top of their stressors are already at least a little bit nuts. I should know. I used to be one of them before I saw the light.)
The legal profession has a way of creating an alternative reality in which we are always “on.” We are either working, thinking about working, worrying about a file, pondering new marketing initiatives, stressed because we are too busy, or concerned about whether we are busy enough, or will be busy enough after the next deal closes or the trial ends. We go on vacation to take a break from all this stress, but many of us then worry about what is happening while we are away — hence those who must check in daily to remain “relaxed.” Which brings me to the quote from The Princess Bride that I started out with. They keep using the word “relaxed,” but I don’t think it means what they think it means.
I asked my friend Merriam Webster for a simple definition of “relaxed” and she suggested, “calm and free from stress, worry or anxiety: not worried or tense,” which sounds about right.
Apparently, there are a group of lawyers (and I used to be one of them) who think it means something like, “a degree of stress, worry and anxiety that can be kept from becoming a total meltdown by checking in at the office and assuring oneself, at least daily, that things are under control.”
It took retirement for me to realize that it is possible to achieve a level of relaxation that is close to unachievable while practising law. To those of you who have convinced yourself that what you are achieving by checking in daily during your vacation is “relaxation,” I can only misquote Billy Joel: “I may be right. You may be crazy.”
This article was originally published by Law360 Canada, part of LexisNexis Canada Inc.