Skipping Vacations (Part 2)
There are 144 days left in 2019. Have you planned your vacation yet? How many PTO days do you have left for 2019? Get moving on it as soon as possible. As we learned in last month’s article, Skip Vacation at Your Peril!, skipping vacation significantly impacts your stress levels, happiness, life expectancy, health, and family.
What reasoning do you use to skip vacation? Are you a slacker; or more accurately, are you concerned you will be branded a slacker? Certainly understandable, according to Business Insider, as it is the number one factor that contributes to 169 million unused vacation days. It is also why 42% of Americans did not take a single vacation day in 2013. Did you work for free, too, this year?
Skipping Vacations Negatively Impacts Our Careers, Society and Nation
The personal impacts are alarming in and of themselves. Who knew working through our vacation days was a detriment to our careers, society, and nation? A year ago, Business Insider pulled together some surprising statistics of economic detriments by choosing work over play.
Americans work 1,836 hours a year more than the rest of the world but take far less vacation.
$65.6 billion of time-off benefits were sacrificed which converts to giving away $748 for free work.
The economy would gain $160 billion in total business which translates to 1.2 million new jobs across virtually all industries.
Vacation can increase performance by 80% which recharges, refocuses and destresses those who get away.
6.5% of people are less likely to get a raise or bonus when they don’t take a vacation.
Working longer hours and more days doesn’t make Americans more efficient or productive.
Quality vs. quantity matters. 40+ hour weeks diminish return.
All Work & No Play Makes Jack a Dull Boy and an Ineffective Employee
It’s not just a money issue, either. Rest derived from vacations, naps, and time off utilizes the non-task oriented side of our brain, called the task-negative network. This part of the brain boosts creativity, productivity, idea generation, and other attributes careers and life decisions require. Daniel J. Levitin, director of the Laboratory for Music, Cognition, and Expertise at McGill University explains, “When you take the time to relax and not think about anything at all, you’ll often find that you stumble upon new ideas and great insight.”
If spending time with family or getting some rest isn’t enough, then do it for the betterment of your career, community, and nation. Take the days you’ve earned and upon returning, feel good about taking time off for the greater good, your family and you.
But where to go, what to do? See the list of links below to get some ideas. Whatever you choose, be sure to breathe in the fresh air, stretch your eyes to the sky and the farthest point. Sometimes it is difficult to step out of our lives and remember what we love to do or what we had wanted to do. I would thoroughly enjoy helping you remember your dreams, set your goals, make a plan and help you find balance, so vacation is no longer a skipped stone in the year, but a welcome respite from daily life. You certainly deserve to take those days off. Let’s set up a consultation and get the life you want and deserve.
http://www.travelandleisure.com/trip-ideas/fall-vacations