Go Take an Actual Vacation

Vacation mode: ON !!!

A recent article from QZ was discussing how our one or two-week vacations are way too short for people to decompress and relieve the stress from work-related burnout.  Some are even suggesting that you should just take longer breaks for every two hours of work during your day to be less stressed out.

Sure we can't be all like the Europeans who work for companies that allow 4 to 6 week vacations.

Instead, how about we, as North Americans, change the way that we treat vacations?  One of the worst things that I see are email "out-of-office" replies saying that the person is on vacation but that they will "monitor their emails and cell phones in case there's an urgent matter".

No wonder people are feeling stressed out.

Instead of keeping yourself electronically tethered to your desk, why not disconnect from work and spend time with your family and friends? What's the point of spending money on a flight, on hotels, museums and on booze on the beach if you're not even going to try to temporarily escape the pressures of your job?

Maybe you legitimately like your job and you don't really want to go on vacation.  Maybe you feel like you're pressured by your employer and the company's culture to stay connected almost 24/7.  Maybe the company's culture has no respect for work/life balance. Maybe you're a control freak who thinks that if you leave, people backing you up won't be competent enough to cover you for a couple of weeks.  Or worse, maybe you're scared that your colleagues won't notice that you're gone because you secretly think that your job is not really that valuable to the company in the first place.  Maybe you're just a really nice person who doesn't want to leave their colleagues hanging out to dry if something goes wrong while you're away.

Sadly many of us see taking vacations as a source of stress. Many people feel stressed before they leave because they do double duty to complete things in advance before they leave.  They also feel stressed immediately after coming back because of the work that's piled up while they were away.

This is why you have people backing you up. In all likelihood, unless your employer sucks at hiring, there should be enough competent and intelligent people who can help pick up the slack while you're away. Trust these colleagues of yours because they'll be trusting you to do the same for them when they go away for vacation.

And for high-achievers who really think that vacations can be detrimental to their businesses, just remember, you can't perform at your optimum level if you're not rested.  Vacations are meant to recharge your batteries so you can push even harder to succeed.  Unless your job has life-or-death consequences, you really shouldn't be allowing anyone to interrupt your vacation.

So enjoy the beach, the lake, the woods, the new city that you're visiting, the taste of the new foods you'll try and/or the historic monuments that you'll see.  You're allowed to leave work for a while and actually enjoy your life.