How to Detach From Your Work?

Do you know this feeling?

You are supposed to be done with work and are not in the office anymore, but your mind still is. You are supposed to focus on your partner or your kids, but your thoughts are still circling around work. You are supposed to sleep, but you just can’t because your mind is still focused on one or more problems.

Especially if you are a founder or solopreneur, you know that your work never ends. There will always be more, and the challenges and problems seem very personal because you are your business. Psychological detachment is hard to achieve when you are ambitious and passionate. So, what can you do about it?

In this edition, we’ll look at the most effective strategies on how to achieve psychological detachment from your challenges.

So, let's dive into: Detach from your work.

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STARTING POINT: VICIOUS VS. VIRTOUS CIRCLE

So, what exactly is psychological detachment? It’s basically that blissful state where you’re physically and mentally away from work. You’re not just “out of the office”—you’re out of your “work mindset”.

I don’t know about you, but I can think of many situations where I was not detached from my work, especially when facing

a) an overwhelmingly high workload

or

b) a highly stressful challenge.

I am sure—if you know this struggle—these two will also be your biggest enemies. According to Sonnentag & Fritz (2014), high job stressors and work overload are the two main influencers when it comes to a lack of detachment.

Your psychological detachment acts basically as a buffer between the stressors on the one hand and your well-being on the other hand and studies indicate that if you don’t mentally switch off, you’re more likely to experience burnout and poor life satisfaction.

And here is the clue: Your psychological detachment can become either become a virtous circle or a vicious one. One the one hand stressors negatively impact your detachment, while detachment on the other hand has the power to positively impact your reaction to stressors.
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What do I mean by that?

Negative

If your business is in any kind of danger, you are less likely to detach. The less you detach, the more intense your reaction towards the stressors becomes. You stress more, which again has a negative impact on your detachment, etc…

Positive

If you manage to detach even though your business is in some kind of danger, your overall stress level decreases. When that happens, you also tend to evaluate the challenge itself as less stressful, causing you less stress and enabling you to detach more.

I think you get the point.

Let’s see how this works.

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STRESS & DETACHMENT - THE CONNECTION

When something stressful happens during your work time, there are always three elements that can influence this process. Three elements that decide about whether you walk the walk on the vicious or the virtous circle.

Starting with:
​JOB STRESSORS 🤯

These can range from task-related pressures like tight deadlines or heavy workloads to role-related stressors such as conflicting responsibilities between co-founders or collaborators, and even social stressors like e.g. conflicts with customers or pressures from investors.

Getting to:
​YOUR REACTION 🤔

The job stressors trigger your reaction, which can show up as physiological responses (e.g. elevated heart rate or sweaty hands), psychological responses (e.g. negative emotions, or behavioral changes (e.g. arguing with others).

Influencing:
​DETACHMENT 🙇

The stressors, your reaction, and especially the duration of your reaction then lead to your detachment. This is highly individual and also very dependent on your daily mood (some days it might be easier for you to detach than on other days).

This process and the connection between the elements is pretty straight-forward:

Stressor arises, you react & based on that you detach more easily or not.

So, how can you do something about this now?
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YOUR LEVERS

Maybe you’ve already realized it, but it seems that there are two areas you can work on:

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1. Reducing your job stressors

2. Working on your reaction to that stressors

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It is important to say that an acute response reaction in the moment does not necessarily have a negative effect. It is rather the sustained activation of this reaction towards the stressor that is sh**: When you get (mentally) into this reaction again and again—even though the stressor itself is not (physically) present anymore.

There are a lot of studies where scientist have tried to figure out which interventions would be effective solutions, enabling people to mentally switch off. Fortunately, Karabinsky et al. (2021) developed a massive meta-analysis and evaluated all of the existing studies to figure out: Which of those interventions make the most sense?

Here is a brought overview of the interventions that were included in this meta-analysis:

1. Interventions to reduce stressors:
   • Reduction of workload by cutting out tasks, hiring others, or automating processes
   • Usage of planning and goal-setting strategies for improved problem coping
2. Interventions on the evaluation of the stressor:
   ​Whether you identify something as a chance, challenge, or threat, and to what extent.
   • Draw attention away from stressors through recreational activities (e.g. having weekends or going on vacations)
   • Emotion regulation by training relaxation or acceptance techniques
   • Distancing from stressors through mindfulness techniques
   • Managing boundaries between work and home (e.g. through separate office or times without technology usage)
3. Interventions on the evaluation of your resources:
   ​How prepared you feel to cope with the problem with the resources available to you.
   • Supported reflection on your self-efficacy (e.g. through coaches or courses)
   • Emotional support from others (e.g. community or partner)
   • Improving sleep through behavioral strategies (e.g. changing your evening routines)

Now, here is what they found:

First of all – Good news:
​ALL three categories, including their different strategies, had positive effects on the psychological detachment (some more than others). The interventions that had the biggest impact were the ones that focused either on taking away attention from the stressor, like recreational activities and managing one’s boundaries (especially digitally) or the ones that altered the evaluation of the stressor itself, through for example emotional regulation.

I know: A LOT OF INFORMATION and strategies to choose from...

To get you started with something, I prepared this little checklist, so you can walk through it step-by-step.

My tip: Only choose one thing that really resonates with you and start with that.

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STEP-BY-STEP CHECKLIST

1. EVALUATE YOUR SITUATION:

• Which stressors can be reduced and how?
  • Check for the possibilities to delegate or automate tasks.
  • Set goals and a plan or roadmap to follow.

Extra Tip: If you are struggling to detach in the moment (e.g., in the evening), write down which problem you want to solve and how & when you can solve it in the upcoming days. One study supported that this concrete planning can be effective for the acute situation.

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2. MANAGE YOUR BOUNDARIES:

• Which times are for leisure activities/time off and which are for deep work and meetings?
  • Set clear timeframes, schedule appointments with yourself and commit to them.
• Which locations are for work and which for relaxation?
  • Find suitable locations (in your home or even with an external office) for different activities and separate them from each other.
• When are you offline?
  • Define and communicate times when you are not available. - Establish times when laptop and phone are completely banned from your activities.

Extra Tip: Discuss this with your partner, because their working behavior also influences your detachment. One study showed that if you are not on your laptop, but your partner is, it will be harder for you to not think about work.

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3. TRAIN ACTIVE DETACHMENT:

• How and when can you incorporate relaxation techniques into your day?
  • Use guided meditations and set achievable goals for short breaks to focus on your relaxing your body or active breathing.

Extra tip: Especially in stressful situations you can train your body through the breath to react differently. Focus on breathing out slowly, because this slows down your heart rate und activates the parasympathetic nervous system (aka relaxation mode). You can make use of “positive” stress for this as well e.g. train yourself during a cold shower or in challenging outdoor activities (🤫Psst: That is also why we're doing a canyoning tour during our Resilience and Growth Retreat)

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4. PRIORITIZE YOUR BREAKS (AND HAVE FUN):

• What kind of leisure activities absorb most of your attention and give you a lot of energy?
  • Identify energy givers and incorporate them in between work sessions, in the evenings, and on weekends.
  • Choose them in the moments based on how you feel (one study showed that this seems to have bigger effects than “forced” activities).

Extra Tip: Plan “detachment islands” (days or weeks in which you completely detach from work) which reset your system to “normal mode.” This is especially important for people who have become chronically attached to their work. In that case, you've built up a routine, and your body doesn’t remember anymore how to detach in-between. It therefore needs longer periods to recalibrate.

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CONCLUSION

As you can see, there is no such thing as a “magic pill” that you can swallow to switch off your mind from your problems. It is a highly complex and very interwoven construct that you have to build for yourself.

Not everything works the same for everyone, and in general, you have an impact if you are committed to a) accepting that your detachment depends on how you handle your stressors and b) integrating small, but gradual changes within your daily life.

It is your personal puzzle, and you’ll have to create the big picture for yourself step-by-step.

But what is certain, is that if you start this process, not only will your future self thank you because your performance and overall happiness will increase, but also the people around you—the ones that want to spend time with the “whole you”: the one that is not only present physically, but also mentally.

Your attention is a gift to others and your personal superpower, so why not start taking control over it?

Stay mindful,

Carina 🌻
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