I met Rachael O'Meara on a boat ride on the Columbia River in Portland, OR. We were both attending Chris Guillebeau's WDS event. We share a similar story of pushing the pause button on our lives to find a new and improved path. You're going to love her story.

Rachael O’Meara was a customer support manager at Google when she realized she was burned out and needed to reassess her path. The best way to do this was to take a “pause”—a time-out to create space for her inner voice to be heard and to align her actions to lead a more fulfilled life. Pause: Harnessing the Life- Changing Power of Giving Yourself a Break (on-sale April 4, 2017) is her new book, serving as a GPS for others looking to slow down before speeding up again. So what is a “pause”?

Rachael defines a pause as any intentional shift in behavior that allows you the space to experience a mental shift in attitude, thoughts, or emotions that otherwise wouldn’t have occurred. Pausing can be as simple as a five- minute walk outside, or a day spent unplugged from digital devices. A pause is about taking a time-out to create the space for your inner voice to be heard and to align your actions with that voice in order lead a more meaningful, fulfilled life.

Pausing offers you a chance to remember what “lights you up,” and allows you to identify your yearnings, shift your limiting beliefs, recognize and better understand what’s called “amygdala hijacks,” and discover how your relationships with others affect you.