3 Tips to Positively Enjoy Your Vacation More

You’ve made your reservations. You’ve paid your deposits. Now it’s time to go on vacation.

Have you planned to have a great time?

Or, do you just hope it will happen and work avoids intruding on your experience?

Here are 3 Tips to Positively Enjoy Your Vacation More:

Demonstrate
In our previous blog, you put into practice “3 Strategies to Avoid Vacation Anxiety.” That is, we:
1. Described the status of your projects and shared it with your coworker and/or supervisor
2. Defined “emergency” for your coworkers and/or supervisor so as to avoid interruptions, and;
3. Delineated re-entry so you removed any anxiety about what you’d face on your return.

When you demonstrate this high level of proactivity in preparation, you say to those around you, “I will enjoy my vacation more this year. I will vacate physically and mentally. I will return re-created.”

Also, this level of professional interaction says to your team members, “That person honors our work relationship and is committed to our mutual success.”

Demonstrate your high value for a Work Positive lifestyle.

Vacate
Most of us enjoy getting out of town. We leave home to put work behind us. Literally.

This physical separation is essential to re-create ourselves for the same reasons we do retreats off-site. Our brain is more creative in unfamiliar surroundings.

Do you mentally vacate, also?

Avoid renting space in your head to work. Invite your mind to follow your body’s lead. Vacate from thoughts of work, as well.

Oftentimes it takes a day or so to detox from the torrid pace of work activities. Proactively return work thoughts to the physical work space. Say to yourself, “They’ve got it handled” or “Okay, that’s what I usually do at 4PM on Tuesday, but what can I do right now where I am with my family and friends?”

The lure of the familiar is strong, even when physically separated from work. Pay attention to what’s important—the people and places where you are in the moment—and mentally vacate from work, also.

Re-create
Do something different to re-create those spaces within you that get worn down.

Activities like sleep late, drink coffee in your pajamas until 10AM, read a non-work related book on the beach, go dancing until 1AM, tickle fight with your kids, go for a long walk with your spouse, swim in a mountain stream, and…insert your fun here.

Sure you may love your work and so it’s not really work. However, all of us have the desire to re-create, to renew, revitalize and restore our creativity, energy levels, and happiness.

Proactively plan and implement your re-creation strategy while on vacation.

Enjoy your vacation more as you demonstrate, vacate, and re-create your Work Positive lifestyle!