< Back to Insights
Healthy (Work) Habits for the Holidays
Holiday season is here – bringing lots of bright lights, presents, and social commitments. This means juggling spending extra time with friends and family on top of the day-to-day responsibilities. Taking care of your personal health and well-being during this busy time is essential. Usually creating healthy habits during the holidays looks like eating healthy, sleeping, and exercising. Laura Buckley, a well-being coach and dietician, joined Mary Abbajay for a discussion around this topic on LinkedIn Live.
This year, we want to challenge you to extend your healthy habits beyond your personal life and into your professional life! We’re sharing five habits that you can integrate into your work life now and carry into any season:
1. Establish boundaries
The holidays are stressful enough on their own, so you don’t need any extra anxiety plaguing you during this time – including work-related stress. If you struggle disconnecting from work at the end of the day, this could be a great time to think about setting some boundaries. This could look like asking for help on a big project rather than working on it all alone. You might consider informing your boss and coworkers of a set time that you log off and stop checking emails each evening.
2. Take stock of your career
What better time to reflect on your career and professional goals than before heading into the New Year? You can use this downtime at work to think about where you are now and where you want to go. What parts of your job do you love? Which aspects aren’t your favorite? Where do you see yourself in five or ten years? Is this job helping you get to where you want to be? These are a few questions to ask when conducting your own career audit.
3. Set realistic goals
After you’ve done your career audit, you’ll gain more clarity about your career path. This will set you up well to start mapping out some goals to keep your professional life on track. When goal setting, strike a balance between creating ambitious and attainable goals. A great way to guide this process is by setting S.M.A.R.T goals. This will ensure you set goals that will challenge you while still being realistic.
4. Make time for breaks
Taking breaks from work is critical to maintaining your well-being and productivity. By breaks we mean everything from taking throughout your workday to actually using your vacation time. Create a habit of time blocking your routine breaks so you know when to stop working and step away from your computer, take a walk, or use your lunch break.
5. Celebrate achievements
You made it through another tough year and accomplished a lot at work – that calls for some serious celebration. Whether you knocked that marketing presentation out of the park or took the initiative to plan your team’s offsite retreat, take the time to recognize your own accomplishments. This will help you head into the new year feeling inspired and motivated to build on your successes!
We wish you all the best personally and professionally as you head into the holiday season and New Year!