Research clearly demonstrates that an annual vacation significantly cuts risks of most diseases by 20-30%….but more than one out of three fail to use their full vacation times.
Of those who do take full time away from their regular jobs much of their vacation time is spent on activities other than rest and relaxation:
- 19% spend their vacation time on family or personal responsibilities.
- Another 13% spend vacation time going to school, working at another job or participating in reserve military service.
- A fourth of employed adults report checking work email or voicemail while vacationing.
- 20% of vacationers are contacted about work matters during their time off.
A self-induced increased workload causes deterioration in marriage and family life undermining the main source of non-work related support. Likewise, avoiding vacation time leads to a decline in efficiency and initiative resulting in an increasing spiral of mistakes and complaints from associates and customers. Accompanying poor work performance is the inability to have fun.
Whether on vacation or at work or at home the ability to have fun improves performance, harmony and health. Here are some tips for enjoying life more:
- Everyday ask yourself, “Am I having fun yet?”
- Be an inverse paranoid: Think the world is out to do you good.
- Surround yourself with people who fill you with joy and laughter.
- Decide to be hopeful and fun-loving
- Don’t take yourself so seriously. Those people who take a cosmic view of life cultivate a lifestyle that allows them to tolerate outrageous fortune. They laugh at themselves and their absurd situations.
- Develop a hang-loose philosophy of life.
- Read, listen or YouTube humor regularly.
- Marry someone (or hangout with someone) who thinks everything you say is funny.
- When a situation becomes stressful pretend it’s a joke for YouTube.
- Practice LOL—it’s internal jogging.
- Play golf. Golf is just like life—difficult and unfair. Par is 18 laughs a round.
When we learn to think funny our life becomes becomes enriched with friends and fellowship.
Let’s get some communication going between you and me. Click on the comment section below and tell me how you have fun. What do you do on your vacation? (Avoid X or R Rated vacation answers, please). How do you have fun?