Judging from my email lately, it is vacation autoresponder season. For the love of kittens and rainbows, please don’t use an obnoxious autoresponder.

But I digress. If you haven’t taken your vacation yet, or at least scheduled time away, you NEED to do so RIGHT NOW!

I’ve heard many people express frustration that time away from work is a luxury they can’t afford. This is extraordinarily short-sighted. In fact, the most successful nonprofit executives I talk to are very deliberate in taking time to “unplug.”

Even if you can’t leave town, you need to at least leave work. Read on if you need more convincing.

We all need rest

One thing you absolutely need to do on your vacation is sleep. No, seriously.

Michael Hyatt makes a great case for sleep in his always-excellent blog. Odds are good you’re not getting enough sleep. While you can’t make it all up at once, your vacation is a great time to implement a new sleeping routine to help cut your deficit.

Besides actual sleep, though, a general state of rest helps immensely. We all have a specific stress threshold, and “draining the tank” will give you more capacity to handle stress when you get back to work.

We all need “clarity breaks”

In Gino Wickman’s excellent book Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business he tells that most organizational leaders spend most of their time, “overwhelmed, tired, and buried in the day-to-day routine, unable to see beyond tomorrow.”

Does that sound like you? Wickman was advocating making regular 30 to 60 minute appointments with yourself to do nothing other than think (which I also recommend), but going on a vacation helps with clarity as well.

To get the maximum benefit, you need to go at least an entire week–more if you can–without engaging in work activities. If you just can’t help yourself, then go ahead and peek at your email–BUT ABSOLUTELY NO RESPONDING!

You’ll find a few things when you do this. First, you’ll see the world more vividly. It will literally feel like a fog has lifted. You will be able to concentrate more. You’ll be able to have more in-depth conversations with your loved ones. You’ll sleep better.

The best part is that these effects will persist even when you go back to work. You will find that you have more energy. You’ll have more focus. And, you’ll be able to think more strategically about your organization and its future.

We all need to know that life goes on

Growing up on the farm, we had several ant hills. I was endlessly fascinated by those little guys. They were always moving as fast as they could, carrying rocks, carrying food, or searching for rocks and/or food.

They all seemed very purposeful and driven (could you imagine an ant just sitting off to the side and lounging?). You could almost hear them saying, “Get out of my way! I’ve got so much work to do!

Sometimes I would step on one. Not in a sick, sadistic way…merely in the process of walking.

And you know what?

Nothing changed.

The ants kept on going on their harried way.

What would happen if you suddenly stopped coming to work? To keep this from being too dark, let’s say you were abducted by aliens rather than meeting an untimely demise.

Your organization would suffer adversity, to be sure. If nothing else, there is a certain amount of “stuff” that you get accomplished that someone else would have to do. There would be a significant loss of institutional knowledge. There would be a jumbling of your staff, either refilling your job or shifting lots of people around.

Eventually, though, things would get back to normal–even if it’s a new normal. Life would go on.

Set yourself free and empower others

This notion of life going on can have a profound impact on two levels: 1) it helps you keep a healthy psyche and 2) it helps your team to grow.

In my coaching conversations, I often hear nonprofit execs lament some variation of, “I can’t get my team to step up.”

I’ve been there. Some members of your staff treat you like the Fire Department; they only call you when their problems are raging out of control and want you to fix it. In fact, they literally use the words, “I feel like all I have time to do is ‘put out fires.’”

One possibility is that you exhibit subtle behaviors to invite this sort of thing. But that is a post for another day.

Even if your team is loathe to take charge, if you are simply “gone” for a period of time–with limited access to phone and email–your team will have no choice but to figure it out for themselves. I’m willing to bet they will surprise you. If not, at least you now know you need to put some different people on your bus.

When they do take on a newfound sense of responsibility, though, you will benefit greatly. There is a tremendous fatigue, mental AND physical, that comes from feeling the weight of the world on your shoulders. When you lose that anchor, you’ll be amazed at the creativity and energy you’ll feel on a daily basis.

What do you think?

What benefits have you found from taking time off? I’d love to hear about it! Send me a message or hop over to the Nonprofit Wizards Facebook page!

Darren Macfee is the founder of the Nonprofit Wizards. His life purposes are to dispense homespun wisdom, grill a perfect meal for his family, and help nonprofit leaders create amazing results for and through their organizations. Follow him on Twitter @NPWizards and like Nonprofit Wizards on Facebook. Be sure to sign up for emails below so you never miss a post.