Relax
Just got on the plane. And, for the first time in a long time I do not need a vacation to recover from my vacation. Maybe you are like me, and relaxing is just not all that much in your vocabulary. Working for 12 hours a day is nothing new here, and then spending the weekends still plugged in or trying to get everything else done that I need to because I had no time to do it because I was so busy during the week. But, this weekend I changed that. I sat on a chair, or in a hot tub, or toured a natural park, or slept in every day. And, it was wonderful.
How often do we allow ourselves the chance to be able to just relax – just chill out. One of my bosses just hopped on his motorcycle and rode for four days to Florida, staying at roadside motels and eating at diners. He said that it was wonderful.
We sometimes fail to realize that if we do not give ourselves a break then we will break. When our expectations are such that we are required to do ten times as much as everyone else in order to just be equal to everyone else, we are doomed for disaster. But, we also feel if we take a break that we will fall so far behind that we will never catch up. We will be judged as incompetent or selfish, and we will be fired or evaluated negatively.
But, if your work is suffering because you have not taken a break, then there is no way that you will get the good evaluation anyway. So, consider a day away.
This reminds me of a resort that I went to as a kid. While at Sunny Brook Farm you were unplugged, mostly because the only way to be plugged in was to use the payphone at the resort. If someone really needed you they had to call the front desk, and you were paged over the loudspeakers to come to the office. If this happened, it pretty much meant that someone died or your house was on fire. Otherwise, you were away for a week. But, as we got into the internet age, things began to change. People felt that they could not be away for a week, so they wanted half a week. Or, they wanted to have wifi available all over the resort, therefore interfering in people relaxing or being involved in the resort activities. As time went on, fewer and fewer families came up to the resort until they finally closed their doors. It was sad when this happened, as every year of my life until I was 18 I spent a week up there with the same group of friends and families. Now that is gone, and I wonder if future generations will really ever appreciate what it was like to just be away and unplugged for so long.
So, try it out – take a break, and relax. Then be rejuvenated from your relaxation, because you cannot relax with your phone in your hand. Let me know how it goes.