Greetings from the Great State of Happiness

It’s the time of year when postcards are being selected, purchased, written upon, smiley faced and hearted,  x’d and o’d, stamped, mailed, received, read, smiled upon,and stuck to the fridge or bulletin board.  Vacation is a happy place.  We work, we stress, we save, we plan, we sacrifice to take a vacation.   And we feel so happy on that first day. And the second, and the third…  Half way through, we start to fire up the worry neurons, just to be sure they still run.  Worry that it’s already half over.  Wait; I’m still on vacation!  Now I’m worried that I worry on vacation.  Then with any luck we can park the worry for a little while, but it’s back there, biding time til it’s back in the drivers seat, while happiness, hopefully, is front and center.  My coaching group and I came up with “what it is” about vacations that makes us happy.

Here’s what we’ve got so far:

• relaxed
• true to natural self
• aware
• focused on what is right
• free
• slower in pace
• noticing
• savoring
• discovering
• joyful (and therefore creative)
• easy laughter
• conscious

What would you add?  What is it about vacations?