Do You Need a Vacation, Retreat, or Mini Retirement?
In American culture, many of us are insulted if someone asks us if we need a vacation but the truth is most of us do need a vacation and it is nothing to feel insulted or ashamed about.
The Power Of Vacation Retreat
Let’s take a look at getting away from it all for longer stretches of time. These are your annual vacations and any retreats you may be going to for personal development or an intensive learning retreat for your job or business.
You Need a Vacation Retreat or Mini-Retirement To Recharge Your Batteries
If you haven’t taken a vacation retreat in a while, you start to feel a little more worn down. In short, you notice how much you need a vacation to recharge when you’re not getting it. Often, we don’t start to realize we really need a vacation until we’re in dire need of one. Think about how much better you’ll do throughout the year if you take the time once a year (or maybe even twice a year) to recharge your batteries.
There are a couple of different reasons vacations work so well. To begin with, they take us out of our normal environment and routine. We’ve talked a lot about the benefits of getting some distance to gain a new perspective. That’s exactly what happens when we go on vacation and it happens in a big way.
Don’t be surprised if you come up with some breakthrough ideas when you’re back from your vacation. Think of it as stepping away and coming back to look at something with fresh eyes in a very big way.
Because we are away from the daily grind and various chores and obligations, we get to relax on a much deeper level. This helps reduce and counteract the stress we have been feeling under. We come back refreshed and with a lot more energy.
Of course vacations are also a great time to bond and spend time with your loved ones. This will go a long way to strengthen relationships that will serve you well throughout the rest of the year and beyond. Last but not least, you’re making memories that will last a lifetime.
It’s Ok To Take Time To Grow As A Person
It can be hard at first to take time out and go on a retreat to grow as a person or business owner. You feel like you’re taking time away from your family and work. Here’s the thing… It’s ok to take time to grow as a person. It doesn’t matter if you’re going on a 2 week yoga retreat or an intensive business coaching retreat to develop your next big product. Heck, it could even be a long conference that helps you with your day job. It’s time well invested.
If going on that yoga or meditation retreat will help you become a better spouse and parent in the long run, isn’t it better for your family to make do without you for two weeks and have a new and improved version of you going forward?
If spending a week or two with your business coach will greatly improve your chances of expanding your business and making sure it will provide for you, your loved ones, and your employees, don’t you owe it to them to attend?
If spending a week learning the latest software your company is planning on using going forward, or getting certified on a new piece of machinery, either of which will give you a raise and bigger job security, shouldn’t you invest the time to do so?
Learning something new and growing as a person is always a good idea and often one of the quickest and most effective ways to do so is to fully immerse yourself in the topic for a week or two. There are even month long retreats that help you reach your goals in record time.
It doesn’t matter if it’s something you do to grow on a personal level, something to help improve your health, or something to move you forward on a professional level. Invest the time and learn.
Not only will you reap the immediate benefit of a better job, better health, or fresh ideas to grow your business, being exposed to all these new ideas while away from the day-to-day grind also gives you a completely new perspective. You start to see things that are unrelated to what you were taught at the retreat.
Don’t be surprised if you’re inspired to clean up your diet and declutter your home after returning from your yoga retreat. Don’t be surprised if you come up with a new content marketing strategy after your business coaching intensive about launching a new product, or switching shopping cart software. Don’t be surprised to come up with some creative ideas for the garden after learning the new drafting software your company plans on using next year. You get the idea.
Retreats tend to have a positive impact that far outreaches what you went there to learn and experience. You will be shaped by the program, the instructors, but also your surroundings and the other participants you meet along the way.
Longer Vacation Retreat or Mini Retirement Can Bring Huge Breakthroughs
Last but not least let’s talk about longer retreats and how they can bring huge break through. Yes, this can happen at a short weekend conference as well and you’ll certainly have aha moments, no matter how you choose to get away and learn more, but there’s something special about longer retreats.
The longer and further you can get away from your current surroundings and day-to-day operations, the more perspective you gain. Time has a bigger impact than you may think. It takes a little while to get out of old thinking patterns and open your mind to completely new and radical ideas. That’s why the occasional longer retreat or even vacation is important.
It gives you the distance you need to create huge breakthroughs. Let’s take an 8 week weight loss camp as an example. Spending those two months completely immersed in learning to eat better, breaking old food habits, and working out regularly can start a huge transformation in your body.
That’s a big breakthrough and the same can be applied to other areas of your personal and professional life as well. Of course you don’t always have to take two months to make a big breakthrough happen. A week or two here and there is often all it takes. The important message I want you to take away from this is that it’s well worth spending time away to work through something or refine your next big step forward.
It’s your time to plan a Vacation Retreat or Mini Retirement
Throughout this guide I have mentioned big and small aha moments that give you a new insight, a new idea, and a new direction to move forward in. As you were reading through the chapters of this short eBook, I hope you’ve had several aha moments of your own about gaining perspective and getting away from it all.
The world isn’t always the way it seems from our current perspective. It’s important to stop and take the time to expand it and change it. Sometimes that can be done in just a few moments, sometimes it takes a 2 week vacation or retreat to make it happen. There are benefits to getting away from it all no matter how short or long you get away for.
Make it a habit to take a mini retirement as time to think, re-evaluate, and formulate a new plan of action based on the perspectives you’ve gained. Come back to this book whenever you need a little extra motivation and a reminder of why it’s ok to take time off to get away for a bit.
If you start to implement what I shared in the past pages, and then come back a few months down the road, the book will be even more impactful. You will have your own examples of the concepts discussed in action. You will have seen that this works and just how powerful gaining perspective can be. It will make the report an even more powerful tool to motivate you to take the next step. Revisit it often and make it a point to give all types of “getaways” a try.
Start with what we’ve discussed in the introduction and chapter two. Take just a moment or a few minutes to think and put yourself in the other person’s shoes before you react. Try to see the problem from a different angle. Then start to make plans for a short weekend getaway or attend a 2 or 3 day conference. Refer to chapter 3 for more details on how this will be beneficial. Last but not least, plan to go on at least one longer vacation or retreat in the next 12 to 18 months. It can have a huge impact on your life.
No matter how you decide to implement what you’ve learned here, it’s important to implement, you will benefit from the time away and the new perspectives it brings. You are designing a lifestyle you love and becoming a better person, a better employee, and a better business owner.
Kimberly “Design” Love is a lifestyle designer and author. After a successful career in interior design and architecture, she redesigned her own life, moved to paradise, and has turned her strengths and talents towards helping people design a lifestyle they love. Her latest book, Design Your Life & Business shares her strategy for designing a lifestyle you love.
