8 keys to make the most of your vacations

Key tips and ideas for getting the most out of your vacation.

The word "vacation" usually makes us think of pleasant experiences and moments of relaxation, but the truth is that, in practice, not everyone knows how to make the most of their holiday period. What's more, some people even get stressed by the idea that they are not enjoying their vacation enough.

In this article we will take a look at some useful key ideas for enjoying your vacation at your own pace and on your own terms..

8 key ideas to fully enjoy your vacation days

Here are some guidelines that can help you squeeze the full potential of your vacation and take advantage of its psychological benefits.

1. Plan with a focus on your social life

Vacations not only give us more leeway to be with our own thoughts and have more time for ourselves; they also help us to bond with family and friends. It also helps us to bond with both family and friends..

Do not waste this potential and try to make some plans together, keeping in mind that these events should fit with the availability of as many people important to you as possible.

2. Maintain a certain schedule control

Even if you are on vacation, that does not mean that your day-to-day life should be totally unstructured and should always obey to improvisation. and should always obey improvisation. In fact, it is advisable that you have planned in advance at least the "structural" moments of the day dedicated to satisfy the basic needs: meals and sleeping hours.

In addition, these time slots should be more or less the same throughout each day of the week, without too many variations, so that you can eat well and have no trouble falling asleep.

3. Explore new places

Regardless of our age and the phase of life we are going through, one of the most psychologically beneficial aspects of the vacations is their ability to make us disconnect from what usually makes us think about elements that generate stress: the office, exams, homework, etc. However, if during these days of free time we hardly expose ourselves to new places and do not leave home, this feeling will be partial and incomplete, because we will continue to be surrounded by elements that can indirectly remind us of our obligations and responsibilities in the medium and long term.

That's why it's good to take trips to new places that help us disconnect. It doesn't have to be trips to other countries.It can be enough with something as simple as visiting places that we know little of our region or province. The important thing is to "oxygenate" our daily life with new stimuli, elements with which we had not come into contact before and that for that reason will not make us fall into the loops of intrusive thoughts that sometimes assail us.

4. Control your use of social networks

If you leave your mind's "autopilot" in charge of what you will devote your time to, you may end up spending a huge part of your day scrolling through social networks, without focusing on anything in particular and letting that constant stream of stimuli distract you... only to fall into regret hours later, realizing that you have barely enjoyed or retained anything about that experience.

These digital platforms are designed for just that, to be the default source of entertainment when you don't have any particular idea about what to do and just go with the flow. And to do that, they use the information they have been collecting about you, so they are particularly adept at that.

If you notice that you tend to have this problem, the best thing you can do is to set very clear time limits on how and until when you can use tools like Facebook or Instagram.

5. Don't get obsessed with comparisons

Remember that a powerful tourism industry has been built on the concept of "vacations", which sometimes tries to make people believe that these are equivalent to expensive trips.

Try not to get sucked into this social pressure through marketing campaigns: focus on discovering what you would like to spend your vacation on with the resources and time you have available.. The best way to plan that time is up to you and no one else.

6. Do not give up your projects

It is good that even though you have days off, you dedicate a part of them to make progress in to make progress on projects that are meaningful to you.. In this way you will not be limited to live only in the day to day, but you will be accumulating progress and seeing what you are capable of when your usual work does not limit you so much.

7. Take the opportunity to adopt a global perspective on your life.

Vacations are also an opportunity to take a step back and reorient your life from a strategic perspective. If during the working weeks it is easy to get trapped in that cycle of attention to urgent tasks and rest during leisure hours, during the holiday period we can go beyond that and rethink our own life from a strategic perspective. we can go further and rethink our priorities and interests..

8. Remember that taking care of your mental health is not a waste of time.

If for some reason you feel you need to attend psychotherapy, don't assume that this means throwing away your vacation. Besides the fact that this process will only take up a relatively small amount of time in your week, it is an investment in your well-being and mental health, it is an investment in your wellbeing and mental health.This is essential to enjoy not only your free time but life in general.

Do you want to have psychotherapeutic support?

If you are thinking of starting a psychotherapy process or you are simply looking for psychological assistance for specific day-to-day needs such as parenting, stress management or certain problems in your life as a couple, please contact us.

At Psicotools we work helping people of all ages and currently we attend both in person at our center located in Barcelona and through online therapy sessions by video call.