Congratulations, the official Busy Season for CPAs and accountants just ended. With 80+ hour weeks finally a thing of the past, it is time to start thinking about getting some self-care. You now have some free time to recharge your mind, body, and soul, but how do you get started?
Below are four ways to decompress and recharge after Busy Season that we hope will inspire you to act and to take the time to care for yourself.
- Go outside. Now is the time to go outside, get some fresh air, and enjoy some time away from your normal life. It is nice to connect with nature because nature brings our senses to life. According to the University of Michigan’s psychology research exploring the cognitive benefits of interacting with nature, “…psychology researchers Marc Berman, John Jonides and Stephen Kaplan found memory performance and attention spans improved by 20 percent after people spent an hour interacting with nature.” So, get outside, get some sun, and enjoy the breeze. You should start seeing benefits immediately.
- Take a vacation. Restrictions are slowly lifting across the country from the pandemic. It is a great time to rent a place and enjoy a few days away from work and the stresses of life. Not convinced that renting that beach house for the weekend will be beneficial to your health? The American Psychological Association published research that provided four reasons to take a vacation, according to science. Those reasons are Life Satisfaction, Physical Improvements, Mental Health Benefits, and Improved Productivity. So, rent that house or cabin and take the time to reboot!
- Reconnect with friends and family. The pandemic has brought people together in close quarters for a long period of time, but it has also separated loved ones from each other. Either way, now that Busy Season is over, consider reconnecting with friends and family – the ones you have seen and the ones you have not seen in a while. According to the Mayo Clinic, spending time with people you love increases your sense of purpose, boosts happiness, reduces stress, and improves self-confidence and self-worth.
- Reevaluate your career goals. It is easy to lose sight of your overall career goals when you have been so directly focused on accomplishing busy season goals for your firm. Now that you have this time to decompress, take the opportunity to really think about your career and where you want to be in the next 5 to 10 years. Guthrie-Jensen Consultants, a full-service organization that offers top-rated training programs to professionals and organizations, suggests that professionals reevaluate their careers when they get time to slow down. Some questions they recommended asking yourself are:
- What accomplishments and strengths am I proud of?
- What professional and personal experiences shaped me?
- What is my personal definition of success?
- Am I upskilling?
- Which new skill sets are essential for me to learn?
If you are an accountant who is thinking about boosting your career by obtaining the CPA license, now is a great time to get started. Passing the CPA Exam will get you one step closer to meeting your career goals before next year’s tax season.
Busy Season is over, so no matter what you do to celebrate, just be sure to include some downtime to relax, decompress, and refresh because you definitely deserve it!