152. How to Use Fallow Periods to Enhance Your Career

Hello and welcome to the Ways To Change Your Workplace Podcast with me, your host, pina Shah. I am a workplace culture strategist, a coach, a people geek, and I'm here to help you to create a workplace that works for you. And your people. Now, today's episode is something subtle, but very, very significant.

It's a phase that most of us go through, but something that we really talk about, let learn value it. We are exploring follow periods in our career. Those slow seasons, the quiet patches, the, I'm not sure what's next, stretches. So let me ask you, have you ever had a moment where you felt like you weren't moving forward?

Like things are just stalled. Maybe you told yourself that you were stuck, but what if that time was actually vital? What if it is where your next chapter was quietly taking shape? So what are fallow periods? Let's discuss that In agriculture, a field is left fallow empty. When it is not planted for a season, it's the purpose of this is for the field to rest, to recover, and to regain nutrients.

It's an intentional pause In our careers, a fallow period might show up as. Staying in a job longer than you intended to losing your drive or passion, it happens. I've been there and done that myself, taking a break due to burnout, redundancy, life changes, or just even a choice just for some time out from the world of work, not knowing what direction to take next.

And yet, what do we usually do? We panic, we compare, we rush to fill the space. And I'm really here talking to my past self, to past Purina who always had a need for speed in her career. Um, always in certain careers anyway, in certain jobs. So it's okay not knowing what direction to take next. We rush to feel the space and the kind of voice that we have within our head.

Our internal voice may sound like I should be doing more. Everyone else seems to have it figured out. Why am I not achieving more? So here's what I want you to hear today. Fallow periods are not failures. They are fertile. Let me repeat that. Fallow periods in your career are not failures. They are fertile periods.

They are often the times when we quietly laid the groundwork for the boldest, most aligned moves that we'll ever make. So I wanna share with you a real world story. So let me share a story from someone I worked with. Let's call her Amira. Okay. Amira, gorgeous name, Amira. Was in a senior HR role. On paper, things were going great.

Promotions, praise projects, but deep down she felt disconnected. She couldn't name it at first. Just a vague kind of unease, and we all have that funky feeling. So Amira started pulling back, not out of apathy, but just from exhaustion and a question mark over her head. Amira called it losing momentum. I call it a fallow phase.

Instead of pushing harder, Amira took space. She started to journal again. She reconnected with her values and slowly she realized that what she really enjoyed at work was coaching, and she had an aha moment knowing that she wanted to pivot to coaching. So that moment of nothingness, it was actually a turning point.

So sometimes we feel really uncomfortable when we're bored or when we just sat fallow, but those periods are teaching us a lot, and it's really important to sit back and do reflective activities. So whether it be self-coaching, journaling, whatever you like doing to really work out what's happening in your head.

So that moment of nothingness for Amira was, like I said, a turning point. And Amira now helps others to navigate their own career. Pauses, her fallow period, became her launchpad. So I'm gonna ask you again, what if your fallow period is preparing you for your next best chapter? If you are feeling the funk, are you really?

Diving deep into why that funky feeling is happening and what exactly is happening. Are you journaling? Are you talking to the right people? Do you have a mentor? Do you have a coach? You know, like all of the good stuff that you should be doing. So let me go on to why, why fallow periods matter. I really want to go into deeper, deeper into why these seasons are really important.

So number one, it's restorative and it's a reset. So our brains and bodies are not built for nonstop output. Fall periods help us to recover from overwork, from stress, from change, and from decision fatigue. Number two, it gives a space to reflect and to realign. When you are constantly in motion, there's no time to check in on your compass, so to speak.

So fallow periods create a space to ask what's not working, what is working, what do I wanna do now, not five years ago, they're often the hidden work phase. So from the outside it might look like nothing is happening. Under the surface, you're gathering data, shifting your identity, perhaps letting go. All of that is work.

It's emotional work, it's foundational work. So seeds are planted quietly. For me, it was a book idea for you, it might be that new skill that you start learning just for fun. It might be an old passion that starts calling at you again. And these don't arrive in busy seasons. They arrive when there's space.

So I want you to reflect, maybe even pause this episode for a moment in a sec. Okay? Where might you be in a fallow period right now? What are you learning or what are you being invited to let go of? What would happen if you gave yourself permission not to know for a little while? Will the sky fall or will everything be okay?

So it's really important to navigate your fallow season. So I wanna give you some actionable tips. Let's get practical. If you are in a fallow period or you feel one coming, here's how to make the most of it. Name it. Do not fight it. Acknowledge that you are in a transition, even if you don't know where you are going yet, it's okay.

Track your energy. Notice what drains you versus what feels good to you. Keep a short daily log. I'm telling you, patterns will emerge. Don't be too quick to feel that space too quickly. It's tempting to grab the next opportunity just to feel that you're in motion again. But sitting with the stillness and seeing what allows to show up is really important.

Another biggie as well. Reconnecting with your why. If you haven't read my book yet, you must, I have a whole chapter on there, an early chapter to find out what your legacy is. What is the thing that you want to leave in this current job? What's your legacy? And I've got a whole practical activity for that.

So returning to your values asks you what does meaningful work look like for me right now in this current phase of my life? Another really important thing is to find your people. Talk to others who've been through career transitions. You'll be surprised how many have had fallow seasons, and now they see this as life changing.

Another biggie, which we don't give ourselves enough credit for, is to rest without guilt. You don't have to earn rest without burnout. Sometimes fallow time is the healthiest, most strategic thing that you can do. I wanna talk about workplace culture and fallow periods. So I just wanna zoom out for a bit.

Okay. So how do our workplaces view fallow periods? Let's get into it. Often our workplaces do not view our fallow periods too well. If you look at your CV and if you've had a fallow period, you are thinking, shit, how am I gonna explain this one? So that's what I'm talking to. We are taught to measure value by visibility, activity, and hustle.

But the real change, the real innovation, needs, reflection and time. It needs unstructured thinking and space to breathe. So if you are a leader, I challenge you. Are you creating cultures where people can pause without being penalized? Can someone not know what's next and still feel supported by you?

Because if we want sustainable careers to normalize fallow time, that's not just good for people, it's good for business. We have to enable this more and more. So. So to close. If you are in a fallow season right now, this is your reminder. You are not broken, you are not behind. You are becoming. Let this season be what it is.

Quiet, uncomfortable. But fertile sometimes doing nothing leads to the very best something. Winnie the poo said that yes, we're getting wise with Winnie the Poo today. So in this episode, I've covered lots of practical tips for you. I hope that it resonated. I hope that you're not feeling funky in your fallow period.

I would really love to hear from you if you are going through a fallow period, because I wanna learn, are you punishing yourself? Are you actually okay with it? Are you embracing it? Are you learning new things? Now? Have those aha moments come? So send me a direct message either on LinkedIn or in the show notes.

My details are in there, and when I post this on LinkedIn, I'd love to hear your experiences of fallow periods. And if you know someone who's in a fallow season, please share this episode with them. It might just be the nudge that they need. Thank you so, so much for tuning into this episode of The Ways To Change Your Workplace Podcast with me, your host, pina Cha, talking all about the funk or fallow periods, but they're actually fertile periods, is what we're learning.

I will see you in the next episode.