Why we should be on a break at times?

Titled as Vacation vs Work: Why Indians prefer to work than take leaves, The Economic Times had released an interesting report. As the title suggests, it is all about our preferring to work more than taking a holiday or getting busy with work over the weekends rather than catching up on a movie or even just taking a stroll in the park with a friend or family member or even your pet. Not exaggerating any bit, I had the same outlook at the very onset of my career. The reason could be either because I was fresh out of college where studying during weekends was more normal that watching a movie or because, I was more enthusiastic about working and finishing assignments and be the good employee that my seniors would praise. Luckily, I am not the same anymore. I do work at home over the weekends at times, but haven’t made it a normal phenomenon of life.

Photo credit: www.forbes.com

I had recently been on a vacation back home after a year. It took a year for me to visit home for an obvious reason, work commitments and not being able to plan a proper and timely holiday for myself. Although going back home for a couple of weeks isn’t quite a vacation, however, it is nothing less. I tend to behave like a tourist and ask my mom to accompany for shopping and visit places. This is only for a couple of days and then, I am back to being normal! Staying put in a different city due to work doesn’t really leave anyone with time to enjoy vacations and weekend gateways are very rare.

The hypothesis that the study, 2013 Vacation Deprivation conducted by Expedia revealed looked and sounded true in many ways: a lot of Indians prefer to work, putting off or cancelling their holidays. According to the study report:

a.       63% Indians feel that they are deprived of vacations and holidays. India, in fact, has been ranked as the 10^th most vacation-starved country in 2013, a deep slide from its earlier of 4^th in 2012.

b.      38% Indians are known to work at least 41-50 hours per week, way more compared to other countries. And what has been worse is the fact that about 74% have cancelled or postponed their vacations due to work commitments.

c.       Another interesting fact is that about 37% of employees in our country prefer earning money in exchange of the unused holidays, a figure that is the highest in the world.

d.      46% of the countrymen have been found to save their vacations so that they can avail it at some future date. India, in this case, ranks third following Malaysia and Singapore.

e.       59% Indians have responded in affirmative when asked whether planning their vacations depend on their work or not. This figure is, again, the highest among the other surveyed countries.

Photo credit: www.joshdesha.com

The study has undoubtedly got some very interesting findings but those are not very encouraging to me. For all workaholics, this is their life story and they are the people who believe in planning vacations once they retire. For others, it’s either the passion to visit new places and take a refreshing break from the monotony of work life, or it’s about just about spending good time with family and friends and come back with a fresh outlook towards life and work. Vacations act as important healers for a stressed mind that helps you calm down mentally and relax your physical body.

Not exactly a resolution, but taking a break from work and keeping myself away from stress is part of my big list of promise to myself. While stress is inevitable and unavoidable, breaking up with it isn’t a bad and a stressful idea!