Comments on: The Key Question

By: Barbara

Barbara — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:53:53 +0000

Home is a place where you feel safe and you can be yourself.

By: Bold Retirement

Bold Retirement — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 03:18:13 +0000

Round-up for HOW LONG IS THE IDEAL VACATION?

I asked the above question to see what kind of range there was to the answers. What surprised me was that range turned out not to be the relevant construct. Everyone who commented pretty much said,”It’s not about the quantity. It’s about who you are with and what you are doing.” And some added “And if I can get a little work done at the same time, great.”

The other thing that was interesting was that no one was yearning for “forever.” A “permanent vacation” doesn’t seem to have much potential as a source of satisfaction.

Gregory Berns, MD PhD explains this in his book Satisfaction: Sensation Seeking, Novelty, and the Science of Finding True Fulfillment. Based on MRI brain imaging studies, he contends that people do not do best with leisure. What we seek is novelty and the chance to address a solvable challenge. He insists that even lab rats prefer to earn their food for those reasons.

Mihaly Csikszentnmihalyi addressed this same set of issues in his book Flow. He pointed out that we SAY we want leisure, but when we talk about being satisfied with how we are spending our time, work trumps leisure soundly. We have a pretty amazing disconnect going between what we are feeling and what we are saying about the emotional value of work.

The reason I asked? The current model of retirement is one of leisure with “spurts” of work–volunteer or paid. If we were more tuned it to what we are really feeling about the work/leisure balance, we would not be looking to give UP work so much as to shape it so that we can have fun as well.

By: PB

PB — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 17:23:04 +0000

I need a vacation just to recoup from all the work it took for me to be able to log this in!!! Anyway, lengh is not as important on a vacation as quality of area and friends that are with you. If you are having fun time flies by – two days camping can be as restful as two weeks, and a 67 day vacation in an around the world trip seemed like any a few days to me. Had a guy ask me one time, ” Hey PB, when you are retired how do you know when you are on vacation” — every day with loved ones, friends and good health is a vacation in itself!

Cheers,

By: kwinz

kwinz — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 21:18:15 +0000

I agree with rkrautr- it depends who you are with. Right now, less than a week is fun, longer than that makes me want to get back to my own cozy routine. It would probably be good for me to train myself to get away for longer periods. So much reliance on home limits my options.

By: erikemery

erikemery — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 17:53:48 +0000

I just took a 3 week trip to Thailand and Cambodia. I think it got a little long, actually. My new rule of thumb would be that two weeks for an international trip, not counting travel time to get there, would be just about perfect.

On the other hand, if I intended to stay in one place for a week or two and just hang out, that takes the strain of travel away, and I might want to stay longer. Especially if I could be in that great place and get a little work done, too, because then I could get into a routine, something I found myself missing a little bit while away this last time.

By: rkrautkr

rkrautkr — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 22:37:31 +0000

I’m not sure the length is as important as how you spend the time. You need to be doing something you really enjoy – and doing it with people that you like spending time with. I have thoroughly enjoyed some mini-vacations of 3-4 days because I was doing something fun with people I love being around.