FINALLY SUMMER VACATION
Summer is my favorite time of year and we are in the dog days of it right now. I love to sneak away from the city and out to Kelowna with my kids every year. We live in Canada and my kids are off school for the months of July and August, but being a basketball family that means we roll with club ball right up to the end of July.
August is truly our only off season and we take full advantage of it.
No sports, no activities. Just down time to connect with one another, eat dinner together, jump in the lake, eat breakfast on the patio, enjoy the heat and have fun. It’s good for the soul of the family and everyone in it.
I coach in a corporate wellness setting and the stats are staggering around vacation usage. Nearly half of all people don’t use their full vacation days. We see clients who are in automatic patterns of behavior, what I call the “day in day out” folks. They wake up and do the same routine day in and day out with little thought to what they are actually doing. Generally speaking, the routine is not healthy either.
The funny thing is that because they are in an automatic pattern of doing they don’t often think of alternative ways of being. That’s where coaching nudges come into play. I’ve had clients who were stressed out and when asked if they had any vacation time available they usually do, but the thought hadn’t even crossed their mind.
I like to get outside of my everyday environment and away from my business to spend time reflecting on vacation. Being away from my everyday creates the space for massive amounts of creativity and outside the box thinking that generally pays off in productivity when I return. However not everyone likes to travel as much as I do, and many of my clients are homebodies and sometimes this is the reason they don’t use their vacation days. With these folks we redefine what a vacation means and the intent of it.
We use it to snap them out of the daily grind and spend time taking care of themselves. This may include food prep and taking the time to try a few new recipes, a long over due massage or other self-care appointments, going for daily walks or doing a private oly lifting session, creating the foundation for new habits, etc. And quite frankly most, if not all, of these things can be done on the road as well.
This is just another piece of the puzzle you can use with your clients to align their health and fitness over time. In the mean time, I’m going to be jumping in the lake with that crew in the pic.