Vacation Guidelines
August 5th, 2006 | by jg3 |Wouldn’t you know it, the title of the magazine is Outside. In this article from the June edition Mark Jenkins does a good job of applying some perspective to our crazy, crazy workaholic lifestyle.
As a nation, we Americans are among the hardest-working people on earth. A 2001 United Nations report found that we work 49.5 weeks a year—3.5 weeks more than the Japanese, a people who even have a word for working yourself to death: karoshi.
He goes on to illustrate something that I’m only just starting to really learn, that getting away is really as important to being productive as getting to work in the first place. I didn’t realize that there is no legal requirement for paid vacation in this country. I just had no idea. I know that I sometimes meet people from other countries on multi-month excursions and I can only dream about ever taking a six-week vacation. But even in a short span like a week or ten days, perhaps especially on such a short trip, Jenkins’ eight rules of vacating are excellent guidelines:
- Take every single day you’re given.
- Go big. Plan vacations of at least one full week.
- Cut out clean. Put out-of-office messages on your voice mail and e-mail.
- Leave your gadgets at home; never check in to the office while away.
- Take a break from all news.
- Forget a raise—ask for more paid vacation time instead.
- Vote for politicians who support a federal vacation law.
- Really vacate: Ban all work talk on vacation.
Update: There is a piece today on NPR’s Morning Edition that talks about vacations and says that just doing nothing, completely vegging on vacation is counterproductive. Listen here … what do you think?
Filed under: about me, adventures, work
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