Reflections on a Week at the Beach
This was our view all week. It never got old!
We just came back from a week at the beach with our kids and extended family. There were milestone birthday celebrations: 16 and 60! (Neither of those was me, btw.) There was a lot of laughter. There was some shopping, beach walking, seafood grilling, hot tubbing, and the perfect amount of downtime.
THE BEST PART:
I didn’t take my laptop! No email, no social media, not even a text check-in with my fabulous executive admin and social media maven. I will admit I missed being in routine, but kept my promise to be fully absent from the business for an entire week! I even opted-out of a retreat with the business mastermind I’m in. It was my son’s birthday, and I PROMISED not to work during vacation, so toot toot! I’m tooting my horn for keeping that promise.
While I completely stand behind this, I will also go ahead and truth-tell: I rarely take a whole week vacation without having a call scheduled that I tell myself would have been difficult to reschedule, or having my laptop in case some kind of inspiration might hit (it rarely does on vacation, at least for me.)
And while sipping coffee on the deck overlooking the ocean one morning, I got curious about why I’ve not allowed myself to fully unplug for a week while away on holidays. It hit me: I have FOMO (That’s “Fear Of Missing Out” for our friends who aren’t current with social media or “screenager” speak.)
I really thought I was past that stage of life, but there it is. I have FOMO and don’t want to miss an opportunity to…uh…not sure what - think about what I’m NOT doing? Tell myself maybe I should make some reels and get to dancing on TikTok? (I’m pretty comfortable saying that will NEVER happen!) Worry that if I’m not cranking out content, my business will implode? I have no idea what I think I’m missing, to be honest, and for the first time, facing the ocean, I allowed myself to let it go.
I asked myself what would be possible if I allowed myself to relax, enjoy quiet time with my husband and family, and just, you know, stare at the ocean.
I liked the answer: I could open new possibilities, release attachment to “should” and be completely present. Eureka!
I decided to commit to more down time, more hand writing of ideas, less screen time, fewer excuses to grab my phone and scroll, and I re-committred to being perfectly OK with NOT jumping on social media trends. Who has time for that anyway?
Here’s the point of this story:
Rest is part of our natural cycle, NOT EARNED.
Vacation/time off is necessary, NOT EARNED.
Downtime is excellent for our brains, hearts and minds, NOT EARNED.
When was the last time you completely unplugged and enjoyed your downtime?
If this is easy for you, please share your secret. Let’s bottle it and make millions together! Kidding. Sort of.
Do you struggle with “turning off” when you're away from work? If so, perhaps it’s time to make some minor adjustments that could have a major impact in your life and business.
Here are a few ideas to get you started:
Take social media apps (or whichever you scroll mindlessly) off your phone for the weekend.
Don’t check your email over the weekend.
Commit to getting outside, spending time with people you love, or reading a book for pleasure.
Choose something that you’d like to do that is relatively easy. Yes, start with easy first.
Let me know how it goes!
If you would like to learn how to take control of your time and energy, contact us. We would love to support you and your team.