3 ways to use your vacation to change your life
Vacations can be like parole - they can release you from the prisons of old routines where others set rules for you, and let you taste a different kind of life. But if you've just done the usual touristy things, lazed around with bottle and cards, and slept most days in a hotel room, you've missed out on an opportunity to turn your life around.
Here are 3 ways to use your vacation to thoughtfully change your life:
1. Try out a new habit
a vacation is a great time to trial a new habit. According to The Power of Habit, to form a new habit, pick a "trigger" when you initiate the activities in the habit, and find a reward when you complete it. Since you are on holiday and don't have to make breakfast or get ready for work or school, you have the mental space and time to do the hard yards. Also give yourself the luxury of a reward when you complete the routine. Hopefully, by the end of your vacation, you'll have put the roots of a new habit.
2. Finish that great book
Use the long flight or train journey to get through that life-changing book that you could never make time for. Sitting in
3. Thoughtful photography
Everyone has a great camera these days. But many of them don't know how to use them well, resulting in an ugly mass of photos that pollute our info-streams. Learn how to use your photo device (if you follow simple rules of thumb of composition, modes, and techniques, you'll be taking good photos in no time). Click thoughtfully, not randomly.
Sometimes, you should just be paying attention to the real scene in front of you, rather than watching it through a viewfinder. There are millions of photos of the Taj Mahal, so unless you can add something unusual, you are better off just taking a personal moment in its magnificence.
And if you do, you'll have something to cherish forever.