What is a vacation anyway? According to Google, who
knows everything, a vacation is a period of time spent away from home in leisure or amusement. Leisure? Amusement? We may not use these terms much these days, but yes, we all need it!
As you are reading this, my
family is enjoying a week at the beach. Thanks to technology, I was able to schedule this email in advance!
For as long as I can remember, I have been a hard worker. When I grow up, I want to be a hard leisurer! Ha
ha! My husband and I are well-paired, in that we are both hard workers. We appreciate the feeling of accomplishment.
Our idea of a good weekend is doing hard manual labor on our land in the hot sun for several
hours, and then eating watermelon with dirty hands and big smiles, surveying all we managed to complete. But we need our "real" down time too.
If I know one thing about myself, it’s that I absolutely need vacation, at
least once a year. It proves very difficult for me to have leisure time at home when there’s always something begging for my attention, which of course is ALL. THE. TIME. (Some of the distractions are furry and have four legs!).
Being a do-aholic, I seldom feel I have earned the right to sit down, much less "waste time." That is changing, with a lot of intention and accountability. But I am still wired to believe that every waking moment needs to be achieving something, producing something, or accomplishing something. Unfortunately relaxing isn’t my automatic response to balance out a day's good effort. I even frame meditation and relaxation as something to check off my to-do list.
So take me away! Vacation, yes please! Remove me from all the temptations and distractions, and help me find leisure and amusement.
Though he loves it once we go, every year I have to convince my husband to take the time off from work. He objects with, But we need to save! And I say, But this is why we have saved!
None of us are promised tomorrow. That doesn’t mean we don’t make long-term savings plans, but it would be foolish to put everything off until someday, so that when all the stars align, when all the right amount of money is in the bank, when we’re retired, when this happens, when this stops happening, etc, we
can finally spend our money and go on vacation. No. We were designed with a need physically, spiritually, and emotionally for rest and recreation. We must treat this need as serious as we do oxygen, food and water, if we really want to flourish and frequently renew ourselves as healthy, happy, balanced human beings.
You may not be able to jump on a vacation this week or next, but right now, TODAY, start envisioning going on one if you don’t have one planned. Believe you deserve it, believe you have earned, and if money is tight, believe that there will be a way for you to do it.
Vacation doesn’t have to break the bank. The goal is to get away from everything that is familiar and treat your spirit to a little happy dance. Check out my daily meditations in Finding the Gift on October 20, entitled, Broaden Your Horizons and October 21, Travel Now. Vacationing can start with overnight trips and
weekend getaways. Start doing some research and see what might amuse you.
We are not machines. We need downtime, and we need greater perspective, which we always get when we leave our familiar day-to-day worlds to
experience something different. This week, I will continue enjoying my family and looking for ways to be amused. Have a wonderful week and please start planning a vacation if you don’t already have one in the works.
