Take a Sabbatical! Prevent Burnout and Realign with Your Purpose | Ep 84

What if sabbaticals aren’t just for college professors and burnout isn’t a personal failure or even a rest deficit? Burnout might just be a quiet signal that life and work have drifted out of alignment and a sabbatical could be an important step in all careers? In this episode, Mickelle sits down with Lyndall Farley, co-founder of BreakSpace, to reframe career breaks as an intentional bridge between chapters.

Lyndall shares how she’s taken 12 sabbaticals (including one that reshaped her entire life in Amsterdam) and why BreakSpace exists: to offer both a roadmap and a community, so you’re not navigating the “messy middle” alone.

Together, they explore the dignity of transition: how to plan for change before it becomes a crisis, how to anchor your break in themes (not productivity goals), and how to return to a life you don’t need to escape from.

In this episode:

• Why burnout is often structural misalignment (and why rest alone isn’t enough)

• The reality of non-linear careers and shifting life priorities

• Founders, identity fusion, and the pull to default into “the next thing”

• How to design a break with themes, not goals

• Lyndall’s 5 psychological phases of a sabbatical, from decompression to re-entry

Learn more: https://gobreakspace.com

Connect with Lyndall on LinkedIn (DMs welcome).

Grab details for the discount at houseofperegrine.com/podcast/ep-084