Ask HN: How do you justify taking unpaid vacation as self employed?

I am not kidding by pasting `much` so many times, please try to look this from a completely different angle: kids really need actual attention from their parents and all those "vacation but daddy works in the hotel room all the time" are painful .. I am saying it as a guy who also has problems with working in free time ..

You don't have to "justify" this to your clients, you have options, please try to look at things differently(and they're not guilty,

"5:18 I have seen what is best for people here on earth. They should eat and drink and enjoy their work, because the life God has given them on earth is short. 19 God gives some people the ability to enjoy the wealth and property he gives them, as well as the ability to accept their state in life and enjoy their work. 20 They do not worry about how short life is, because God keeps them busy with what they love to do."

If that means eating and drinking while working so be it. There is no point to life. Vacationing is just as empty as working. At least with working something is accomplished.

Burn out is due to a tension in the person's mind between knowing that they only have work and the desire to have fun. When you make work fun, the tension dissolves. That's not to say you shouldn't unwind. Every engine needs a chance to cool off. Rather, you should realize the cool down period is only a few hours, which is well within OP's time availability.

Like you, I have way too much to do and not enough time to do it all. But one of the great tools in our arsenals is flexibility. It makes it possible to radically adjust the when, where, what, and how aspects of our jobs:

when - I do most of my work in the afternoon and evening. I may also do a few hours on Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays. I rarely work in the morning, and schedule all calls to take place late.

where - I usually work at home, but also work outside (libraries, in my car while waiting for kids' activities to end, etc.). I do take my laptop with me on vacation just to keep things going. A few times I have done longer stints abroad, working FT but enjoying life in another country.

what - I choose what to work on, new projects to launch, and what can languish. If something is not generating revenue or is too troublesome, I will make adjustments accordingly (killing project, hiring a contractor to maintain it).

how - No one tells me how to get the work done. That's my call. Increasingly, I have been outsourcing things I don't like to do or don't do so well.

One other thing: I have set up a monthly payroll, so I get paid regardless of how much or how little I do. That is, there is no "unpaid vacation."

I have operated my own business for 7 years.

meaningless, vanity, this is what life without God, life focused only on the material, physical reality "under the sun" looks like: “1:14 I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.".

That's what focusing on the temporary leads to.

And even opening the New Testament, you can see Corinthians 4:18 "So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

The message of the gospel is full with hope: it doesn't teach that "There is no point to life." and that life itself is meaningless .. as what is temporary, is not the important part of life at all.

In this sense, most jobs is often focused on the temporary and we shouldn't idolize them, as it's sadly easy to addict to work. And of course: I think it's great to enjoy your job and to find fun in it, but to keep in mind it's just one aspect of earthly life, and not an ultimate goal. It's not something to "obsess" on. And "accomplishments" are a very subjective thing.