Many of us fantasize about switching off email and chat notifications and retreating to a beach where no communication app can intrude. Fantasies aside, how often does the typical employee actually use their vacation time each year? Turns out, not nearly often enough.
When we were kids in school, summer was an exciting time, used to relax and take a break from the studies. This mentality often sticks with us into adulthood, sometimes leading to lower performance rates at work. During the warmest months of the year, the productivity slump can get as annoying as the heat outside.
Do you know that feeling when you can’t wait for the summer to come faster, as if it were your salvation from all the stress and grim feelings gathered over the year? If you are familiar with that feeling, you should use your summer vacation to improve your mental health.
After a well-deserved vacation or relaxing staycation, it can be difficult to return to work. Your emails have piled up in your inbox, each one demanding your immediate attention. Your colleagues needed answers two days ago. What’s more, your boss already has a long list of tasks waiting for you. And all this happens while your brain struggles to transfer out of vacation mode. Don’t worry, the post holiday blues can be cured!
Vacation is that time of the year when you finally relax and disconnect from daily stress. And most people can’t wait for it! However, some can’t really afford it either due to a lack of money or time. While workers in Europe are entitled to up to 30 days of paid vacation time every year, in the U.S. companies are totally free to choose whether they want to give their workforce any paid vacation at all.
Look around at any airport and you’ll see people surrounding outlets, sitting on their laptops and phones. According to the State of the Remote Job Marketplace report, 43 percent of the workforce works remotely at least some of the time. A major perk of distributed work is the ability to be traveling while on the clock.
Most adults spend up to 11 hours per day digitally connected one way or another. We use screens for work, for fun, for shopping – basically our entire lives revolve around a screen. While some people don’t see that as a problem, 1 in 5 people have taken a digital detox, and 7 in 10 people are trying to limit their screen time.
Photo by Kalen Emsley on Unsplash
Nearly half of small business owners in 2014 reported missing their summer vacation due to a fear of unplugging – i.e. to leave their business unattended – according to a survey by office supply chain store Staples.
Needless to say this is bad. For all the material advantages that good business produces, at the end of the day it’s the sum of all things that makes or breaks a person. We are living, breathing creatures that need to unwind in order to function properly. Forget to do it and you end up with an always-on society that never shuts up and forces every individual to do the same or fall behind