North To Alaska

I am leaving tomorrow to spend a week with some very close friends in the small Alaskan village of Halibut Cove. I have never been to our 49th state and am very excited about seeing and experiencing its rugged wilderness and beauty.

However, as I pull my things together and start packing I notice that there is a part of me who does not want to go. I have just started a 6 month intensive coaching class to rebrand and build my business and there is a fair amount of resistance about leaving right now.

It is an interesting process to watch for I have always been a huge proponent of vacations. I talk to my clients all the time about taking time off and about getting away from the speed and intensity of everyday life. Yet, here I am getting caught up in the story that if I take a week off, things will fall apart, I will get behind in the class, my business will suffer…etc.

When I step back and look at what is going on, I see just how difficult it can be sometimes to let go of our identity as a professional and slip into being just a regular person on vacation. To truly be on vacation means that, for a short period of time, we are no longer the coach, attorney, businessperson or consultant that we are comfortable being. We are just us.

That sounds great, yet so many of us have lost touch with who that person really is. And I think that some people may fear that they won’t be able to find themselves under all the layers of business wrap.

But that is why vacations are so important. Vacations allow us the time and space to reconnect with ourselves, as well as our families. They help us slow down enough to be able to revisit what is important to us and notice how we have gotten off track. Our minds quiet down which allows our creative side to emerge and issues and problems that had previously seemed monumental are mysteriously resolved.

Vacations are very good things. They allow us to refill our emotional buckets, re-energize our bodies and reconnect with our little kid who is so full of energy and fun. Vacations are a necessary pause in our hectic lives and I am going to try my best to take full advantage of my trip to Halibut Cove. I hope you, also, will take the time to take some time off this summer!

Twenty-five years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So, throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. Mark Twain