There have always been three key dates in the annual leave calendar: Christmas, the spring bank holidays and summer. The first two instalments are all about maximisation; weaselling 16 days off for the price of eight in order to save up for more weeks of suntanning and socialising in June, July and August. It feels like winning – but really, it’s a balancing act, which I learned the hard way. Such was my dedication to eking out the most from the standard 28 days, I even took a meeting from the luggage collection conveyor belt at Gatwick. I wasn’t relaxed or well rested – I was manic.
After a serious bout of burnout, I decided to try something different: mimicking the school holidays. Not in terms of dates (I don’t have limitless cash, a love of queues, children, or a weird desire to hang out with other people’s) but, in terms of structure. Roughly every six to eight weeks or 43 days, as was found by researchers to be most effective to stave off exhaustion, I’d book some days off; Cyprus with my mum in October, Christmas at home in December, a wedding in the US in February, some time spent with my dad in late April, a long weekend in June, my birthday in August, and a trip to Italy in September.
The result? I was better rested, more alert, happier and full of ideas that made both my personal and professional life more enjoyable. I cried less, got frustrated more infrequently, and found it easier to find the joy in my daily life having been entirely away from it for a little while.
While, admittedly, it might sound like I’m sharing something very simple, in the UK we’re not the best at taking time off. Although many of us hunt for a cheat sheet to take as many days away from the office as possible, others store up days off to take if or when a good offer comes up. Except, as we’re distracted by deadlines and life commitments, that occasion never comes. In fact, in 2024, British workers left an average of 5.3 days of annual leave unused, which is the equivalent to a whole week off.
The September school year was established around the late 19th century to fit the agricultural cycles and allow children to work in the summer harvest before returning to class in the autumn. Meanwhile, bank holidays were introduced in 1871 to provide workers relief from long working hours, with half-terms being formalised in the Forties and Fifties to offer the same relief to teachers and pupils, because it was necessary.
At school, and in the workplace, we’re taught to maximise productivity – but no one teaches us how to take time off. During education, it’s simply mandated. But by adulthood, we’re expected to navigate those choices alone, with many of us floundering under the pressure of employment and ending up thinking of ourselves last. “We need to educate and encourage people to take the amount of time off that’s really healthy for their physical wellbeing,” says work and organisational psychologist Michael West. “But also, for their happiness and ability to spend time with friends and family. Connection with others is at the core of wellbeing.
“People are quite surprised just how profound the effects are,” he adds. “We know that when medical and nursing staff take proper lunch breaks, their recovery is better and their patient care is safer. They make fewer mistakes that can cause harm. We’re not well educated about this aspect of our lives. Yet when we take the time to recover, our productivity, and equally importantly, our creativity and innovation, are much better.”
In many workplaces, the only times your manager will pull you up on not taking enough annual leave is if the year is about to end and they’re scared you’ll try and carry it all over. By then, it’s too late – burnout has begun to set in. “Symptoms are emotional exhaustion, irritability, engaging in interactions with other people in a depersonalised way,” explains West of the dehumanising impact. “You stop being present, stop empathising, and that depersonalisation is really damaging.
“Other signs are when work starts to interrupt your sleep,” he adds. “If you’re thinking about work before you go to sleep and first thing in the morning, then it’s a pretty good indication that maybe you need a break.”
Although the “every six to eight week” mark is a pretty good rest routine, West warns against being too prescriptive and instead advises to really listen to yourself. According to the British Psychological Society, the wellbeing benefits of taking time off can last anywhere from a few days up to six weeks upon return to work. “It depends on your job,” says West. “When you have a lot of joy at work, you don’t need so much recovery.”
Aside from burnout, which 81 per cent of UK workers said they experienced if they couldn’t take time off for several months, one nine-year study found that men who didn’t take regular annual leave are at significantly higher risk of heart attacks than those who did. Meanwhile, researchers at University College London found that overworking could be linked to a higher risk of stroke. Simply put, it’s dangerous.
It’s also important to note that how we spend our time off is almost as important as how often we take it. One study found that activities that best aid recovery are things that enable you to detach from work, like watching a Netflix series or having dinner out, relaxation activities, like meditation or listening to music, or mastery – things that stretch you a bit – like cooking a new recipe, learning a language or a new hobby.
This also applies to annual leave. “Some people might go on holiday to Tenerife and get blasted every night on alcohol,” says West. “You’re not going to recover doing that because your body is going to be damaged. Physical activity and spending time in nature is hugely valuable for recovery. So, when taking time off, it’s about taking account of all of these factors; both the activities we engage in and how often we have time off.”
Ultimately, the point of annual leave is to keep you feeling human. If we never needed time off, we’d be robots – and as technology takes over numerous career paths, we should be striving to be decidedly different from that. We are more innovative employees and happier, more compassionate people when we take our full 28 days for ourselves.
“Many people spend their time feeling exhausted, and we know people are feeling increasingly lonely, too,” says West. “We can all see something has gone terribly wrong in society – and a big part of that problem is our attitude to work. We should be seeking ways to maximise people’s opportunities to do the things that help them be happy,” he asserts. Annual leave: the new most important meeting in our calendars.
