I noticed an odd pattern recently, upon returning from
that latest intense wilderness adventure. It’s not the
first time this has happened.
When people asked how my vacation was, I bristled. An
odd response, I know! I immediately insisted that I
wasn’t on vacation, I was on an adventure, or was at a
conference, or was doing something else work-related or
difficult.
Upon examination, I find that there are two reasons I
respond this way. One is because deep in my
conditioning is the belief that a “vacation” is a time
to relax, play, do nothing productive, and it is only
appropriate when it’s “well earned.”
That means of course that one has to have worked
really, really hard, struggled, suffered, sacrificed,
achieved something significant, and now “deserves” a
break.
When I’m doing my usual life, it’s a mix of working
hard and playing. I’m self-employed, so I’m on my own
schedule. Usually, I’m working on things for which
there’s no finish line in sight, and I usually feel
that I haven’t done enough to “deserve” a vacation.
Then, I notice that no matter how much I’ve done, that
belief that I haven’t done enough is ever-present. With
that belief in place, I will never, ever, “deserve” to
take a vacation.
Instead, the choice is between guilt and work–or, a
whole lot of justifying that it wasn’t “really” a
vacation.
Hmmm! Time for some re-examining of those beliefs,
wouldn’t you say?
How is it with you and vacation?
Your thoughts?
doing something that isn’t related to work isn’t bad. our work, while we are on a recreational endeavor doesn’t ever leave us. We jsut focus on other things and put it “on the back burner” so to speak. It would seem to me to be healthy to put our focus on something else and let work aside for a while. hemingway went fishing and it didn’t seem to hurt his writing.
I do vacation things and my fiction stories are still on my mind and sometimes it helps to allow me to finish a scene which I am struggling with, when I “don’t HAVE to work at it”.
I received this comment by email and wanted to share it.
> Hello Dr. Gayek,
>
> I went to your blog to leave a comment about vacation, but found no
> place to do that. (it’s a confusing place, no offense intended)
>
> On Vacation: Seth Godin says, design a life that does not require you
> running away from it.
>
> I take a lot of road trips these days. When I first started doing that
> about three years ago, people would ask the same question and I would
> be lost on how to answer it. Then I just started telling them it was
> fabulous, but it was not a vacation, it was just a part of my normal
> life. Their reaction was always the same: “must be nice” (an attempt
> to make you feel guilty for living a full life). Now I just smile and
> say, Yes it is. You should try it. (oh! all the excuses)
>
> Now the people who know me ask: how was your latest trip? where did
> you go? what did you do? etc. New friends have to go through the
> initiation till they know and understand the difference.
>
> Thank you for sharing your adventures
>
> Rasheed
> aka Mister Weirdo
Rasheed, thanks so much for writing, and for your effort to post a comment. My apologies for the difficulty. What I should have done is give the link to the specific article, which is here: http://happyhealthsystem.com/blog/archives/1005 . On that page, you’d scroll down to the bottom of the page where there’s a space to leave a comment. Because I get a lot of spam, I have it set up so I have to approve the first post from someone. After that, you’re good to post to your heart’s content.
For future reference, if I neglect to give the archive URL, all you have to do is click on the title of the article that appears on the home page, and it will take you to the page where you can comment.
To save you the trouble this time, I’ll post your comment. If you’d like to go to the page and add anything, I’ll then be able to “approve” your post so you can post in the future.
Meanwhile, thanks for the content of what you wrote! I love your response, and will use that one myself. It’s amazing how many people don’t know that they’re free to create their own reality.
With appreciation,
Alexandra
Hello Dear Alexandra!
I had to chuckle when reading this post. Since 2009, I have been leading a gypsy life. I am homeless or, as I prefer to see it, everywhere I am is my home. You might say I am on a quest for a number of reasons too long to go into here. So I will not settle for a “normal” life ever again unless it meets my awakened standards. I sometimes don’t even know where I will be resting my head the next week or if I am going to be able to pre-pay for my cell phone. As you can imagine, this leads to a lot of traveling. At first I was taken back a bit when people asked about my vacation not knowing what exactly to answer as I didn’t want to go into all the details of the results of my choices. Now I happily say, “My life is a vacation!”
To you and all your readers, I’d like to remind everyone that one of the big reasons we are here is to enjoy this experience called life. While there are a number of other reasons we came here, hard work was never a goal – although sometimes we choose it to get to a goal. Pretty sure not too many people would say on their death bed, “I wish I has worked harder”. But some may wistfully think they wished they had truly “Lived” life more. Thanks for being such a great example, Alexandra, in this regard!
Namaste ~ Michelle