Dolce Far Niente: Why Doing Nothing Might Be Your Most Important KPI This Quarter

I was supposed to be editing the episode.

Instead, I found myself staring out the window, thinking about how long it had been since I felt in it — like really in it.

And that’s when I knew something had to change.

I wasn’t behind schedule. But I was ahead of inspiration. The ideas were fine — just not sharp, not urgent, not fully me.

My brain felt cluttered, my calendar packed, and my creative well was starting to feel — dry. Not empty. But echoey.

So I made a call I’d never made before: I paused.

No new episodes. No newsletter drops. No pressure to fill the feed.

Instead, I booked a trip to a place I’d never been — Milos. Three days. Just enough time to leave my routines behind and see what came up without a deadline chasing me.

There’s a concept the Italians (and, funny enough, INSEAD academics) call dolce far niente — the sweetness of doing nothing.

At INSEAD, dolce far niente is framed as “intentional idleness,” a deliberate pause that allows the unconscious mind to incubate ideas.

I used to think “doing nothing” was a waste of time. That momentum was the only thing that mattered. But I’ve come to realize that without stillness, you don’t get clarity. Without rest, your instincts dull. Without distance, you can’t zoom out and see the bigger picture — let alone redraw it.

Stepped away from the feedback loops. Not because I didn’t care — but because I did.

And then something surprising happened.

Ideas came rushing back.

Not the obvious ones. Not the ones I’d already scheduled. But the deeper ones — the ones that arrive when you finally create the space for them.

I started asking different questions. Ones I had been too busy to even think about:

• What would I build if I wasn’t chasing a deadline?

• What would I write if no one was watching?

• What do I want The J Curve to feel like six months from now?

This isn’t about burnout. (I’ve danced with that one enough times to know the signs.) This was about creative recovery.

It’s easy to treat consistency as a religion in this game. Show up. Ship. Repeat. But sometimes, the bravest and most productive thing you can do is skip the drop. Not post. Not take every call. Sometimes you need to protect the source material — your mind — or risk recycling ideas until they’re just crap.

So here’s what I’ve learned from this season of sweet nothingness and intentional re-entry:

1. Recovery is part of the process

Taking breaks doesn’t kill the fire — it controls the burn. The best founders I know build time off into their process the same way they build OKRs. It’s not indulgent. It’s tactical.

2. Presence is underrated

In Milos, there were no notifications. No slides. No Whatsapp. Just the sun, the sea, and a journal. That kind of presence felt rare. And it reminded me what focus actually means.

3. The 20% that moves the needle becomes obvious when you stop reacting

You can’t see what actually matters when you’re busy trying to do everything. The famous Pareto rule becomes more than a principle — it becomes practical. You see exactly where your effort matters most. When you take a break from reacting — you make room to originate. I came back with sharper ideas, new angles for J Curve content, and fresh energy for founder conversations.

4. You don’t have to earn rest

This one took me a while to learn. But you don’t need to justify taking time for yourself. Sometimes the most strategic move is stepping away — not for retreat, but for recalibration. In the long-term, it’s the only way to build sustainably. You can’t be useful to anyone if you’re drained.

Feels like I finally swapped the blunt knife for a sharpened blade.

Because what this break reminded me is that real progress doesn’t come from nonstop motion. It comes from knowing when to pause — and then choosing your next move with intention.

So if you’ve been stuck in the loop of always pushing, always posting, always proving — maybe this is your cue to step back. Not forever. Just long enough to remember what you’re really building, and how to build it better.

We’re back. Recharged and firing on all cylinders.

If you missed it, check out our recent episode with Federico Vega, founder of Frete.com — it’s packed with hard-won lessons on building and scaling network effects in complex, fragmented markets.

And if you’re a founder building from Latin America with global ambition, don’t miss our upcoming strategy session with AWS on how to scale beyond borders. We’ll go deep on what changes when you start selling, hiring, and fundraising internationally — and how to position your company for breakout success.

Join us live in São Paulo → RSVP here 

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 P.S. If this issue was valuable to you please share it with a founder who needs to hear it. Let’s build LATAM’s next tech leaders—together.

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