I felt mildly melancholy returning home from my trip to the Bahamas. I sat in my Prius aimlessly changing radio stations, sitting bumper-to-bumper in midsummer Los Angeles smog. Nothing on the radio sounded good.
Coming home to a concrete jungle after running barefoot on beaches and swimming in crystal blue water took a bit of an adjustment. I love Los Angeles. It’s an epicenter for creativity, diversity, and delicious world cuisine. We have gorgeous beaches, mountains, and house some of the most incredible humans on this planet. Yet, a part of me still craved the simple island life.
It’s not uncommon to feel post-vacation blues, especially when you live in a major metropolitan city, like New York City or Los Angeles. I was grateful for travel and felt incredibly rejuvenated. However, the relaxed Bahamian culture made my current imbalance very clear. I needed more relaxation, self-reflection and creative time. Don’t we all?
If you are suffering from post-travel blues or need a mini vacation, the following tips will help:
3 Ways to Take a Daily Vacation:
1.) Go on a Nature Date. You can go on a long hike along the coastline or simply take your shoes off and walk barefoot in your backyard or at the park. Go to the beach or to the arboretum. Study a plant in the botanical garden and write a poem. Grab some living water and enjoy the healing vibrations of Mother Earth.
2.) Create Space to Create: Whether it’s 30 minutes, 3 hours or 3 days, schedule time on a regular basis to write, paint, or create. Creativity is fundamental to living a healthy life. Art and creativity are instrumental, often the crux, in our healing journey. I’ve dabbled in every art form, and each one of them has shifted me and helped me heal.
3.) Plan a ‘Staycation’: Stay home and do nothing. Our home can be a very grounding, supportive and nourishing space, if we set that intention. Pour yourself a glass of organic vino, roll up some green or plan a detox. Make Love, eat coconut ice-cream, meditate and make love again. Sit back, and enjoy the simplicities of life.
Pressing our toes deeply into wet sand is like pressing a reset button, re-tuning and recharging our mind-body-spirit to vibrate at nature’s highest frequency. Travel gives perspective, a pause in regular daily programming to visit new vistas. Travel interrupts our habitual patterns of thought, behavior and relationship. Taking a trip demands that we defy the rote repetition of daily life and make space for novel experiences, which are necessary for transformation and growth.
When my inner voice demanded, “I need more time and space to write and create,” I decided to take time off work and listen.
In the modern world, we need more time to self-reflect and just BE.
Vacations and ‘Staycations’ can act as potent and exponential healing agents. Retreating into nature and Self is a requisite for rebalancing our bodies, doshas and harmonizing our circadian rhythms to the cycles of the sun and moon. Increasing internal balance, realigns our life to fulfilling our passions and dharma (soul-purpose).
Take regular pauses in life. Live life on purpose.