I hope all of you have organized yourselves to plan vacations for the summer. Even if you can’t take any time off from work and you only have a weekends free make sure at least one is a vacation.
A vacation doesn’t have to mean going some place; it can be a state of mind. I am not having a out of town vacation until the end of July. I found myself needing a vacation now, so I set aside last weekend for a mini-vacation. You would think I might go somewhere but I needed the vacation because I was tired. So I vacationed “in place.” I slept late on Saturday morning and lollygagged about for as long as I wanted to. Then I joined my mother to grocery shop which we did in a leisurely manner. No hurry-up-and-go then gotta get back and get something done.
When I got home I ate the piece of cake I bought at the store. Then I read all afternoon. Listened to the news on WAMU at 5pm and continued to read. Turned on Hot Jazz Saturday Night (WAMU at 8pm) to play in the background as I wrote and read the evening away.
Woke up at 5am. Instead of getting upset, I read for two hours and then went back to sleep until 10am. Got up and made a sort of strawberry short cake breakfast. As you may guess, part of vacation for me is eating fun things. I whiled away the rest of the day reading a mystery, chatting on the phone and writing. It may have lacked adventure but it was what I needed.
We tend not to listen to our body for when it needs a break. For that matter we tend not to listen when our brain needs a little TLC either. You have only one body with one brain so take care of it. When you are carrying a lot of tension or stress for days or weeks, give yourself a low-key impromptu vacation. Don’t make it about planning or doing, but about not planning and not doing.
I chose reading, writing and listening to the radio because those are activities that are relaxing to me and I don’t often have time to indulge in them as much as I would like. OK and eating treats too!
What are the things that you can do for yourself in a stay-in-place vacation that brings you peace, relaxation and maybe even some joy? Indulge!