I took 8 months off before starting grad school and I do not regret it at all . I used the time off to sleep and relax , travel , explore some of my other interests unrelated to my field , and work . All that time off allowed me to decompress after undergrad . After my bachelor , I was sick and tired of classes , school , and engineering . I read , wrote , and drew a lot . All things I love doing , but I had to abandon due to my crazy workload . After a while though , I started to miss it and was excited to go back . For me , it allowed me to take a much needed mental break and find my motivation back . The biggest con was how rusty I was . Some of the concepts and tools I hadn ' t used in a long time , so it took a while to readjust .