I suppose I was planning my first sabbatical before I even started my career. In fact, I’m sure I was already heading in that direction before even graduating college!
I became hooked on long-term travel after backpacking in Europe and studying in London while at Syracuse University. After that experience, it was easy to decide to delay a career after graduation and go backpacking again. My partner in crime was Holly, whom I met the very first day at Syracuse. She had studied in Australia one summer during high school and mentioned that she wanted to revisit after graduation. Still high on my experiences in London, I quickly jumped on board to go.
We got jobs for a few months in our various fields to make some money and gain professional experience, but we weren’t as crazed about finding them as our fellow classmates were. Our eye was on six-months of backpacking in Australia, New Zealand and Fiji. So in a way, this was our gap year post college.
When we finally set off on our journey it was 1995. And at that point I decided I would return again to Sydney in 2000 for the Olympics. But this time I wanted to add on Vietnam & Cambodia, two countries that I had a great fascination with. That trip was to be alone, but once Holly got wind of it, she decided she would come along as well. It’s hard to find a good travel partner, but in Holly I had a fantastic travel partner, so I couldn’t say no!
The one caveat was that she needed more time to save money and she wanted to trek in Nepal. It was worth forgoing the Olympics in order to have Holly as a companion, so the date was set for Fall 2001.
During this time in my career, I had an ideal job for myself with the Starlight Children’s Foundation in New York City. I had always been involved with philanthropies from a very young age, and being a survivor of childhood cancer, I felt strongly in Starlight’s mission of helping seriously ill children, their families, and the hospitals that treat them. I was given a great deal of responsibilities, including managing the volunteer & intern programs, overseeing three major special events (two galas and a sports auction), as well as all marketing materials and newsletters. I was able to combine my loves of design, event planning, and volunteering all into one.
As the end of 2000 was approaching, I began plotting my travels. By the time I was to leave, I would have been with Starlight for 5-1/2 years. I was already getting antsy with my role and since it was such a small organization, I knew if I wanted to move up, I would need to move on. Then in December of 2000 a new opportunity presented itself.
As part of my job, I worked closely with the in-house video production facility of our corporate sponsor producing our yearly fundraising video. Well, I suppose I worked more closely with them than was required because I fell in love with production. Before I knew it I was creating outlines, scripts, & storyboards, as well as conducting interviews and overseeing shoots & edits. It was a different industry for me yet I was able to use my skills in new ways, while learning so much.
At that time, the editor I worked with took over managing the facility. He approached me and asked if I’d be interested in working for him. Since we already had a great working relationship, I saw this as an excellent opportunity for me to break into the production world. But what about my planned career break?
I decided that my planned travels were still important to me, and was able to negotiate that time off before I had even started. A few things I had going for me was an already established working relationship, and one where my skills and work ethics were respected. And I was technically being hired as a consultant, so despite not receiving benefits, the biggest benefit I cherished was the opportunity to have the flexibility to travel.
So my career break in fact turned into a sabbatical!
This experience taught me that it’s important to keep your eye on your dreams, and for me that involved travel. And even when life throws you a curve ball (and it will), don’t look at it as moving you off course. Look at it as a different path to lead you to your goals.
So what happened on my sabbatical? That will have to wait for another post – but here’s a preview of our trek on the Annapurna Circuit!
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