11 Ways You May Be Sabotaging Your Vacation

Sometimes and maybe most times, it's best to go back to the basics to gain a little perspective.  That's the case with me and the concept of a good vacation experience, because frankly, I suck at planning them.

Full disclosure here.  I make my living working in the world of vacations, so you'd think I might have a handle on this kind of thing.  And yes, the fact that I've centered my work around vacation experiences sounds like the beautiful oxymoron that it is.  I'm surrounded by crisp palm-laden images of gorgeous resorts and happy families skiing moguls or strolling white sand beaches all day.

But even with the prospect of relaxing somewhere in an inventory of over 45 resorts my employer offers, I still haven't planned one.  It's not that I don't have the time, but that I've lost the practice of treating myself to a good getaway, Away being the word I need to underline here.  And that's true for not only me.

Having access to spacious resorts means I've got it good compared to most of my friends.  For them, the concept of a family vacation has dwindled from a yearly relaxing treat to a high-pressured scramble to plan hotel accommodations in cramped spaces.  By the time they've finished coordinating days off then pouring through ratings and price comparisons, they've all but given up on the idea of taking the trip.  As a result they end up staying home, and like me, convince themselves it's ok to"just take it easy this year".

All that experience really ever does for me is to make for a very short water-cooler conversation on my first day back.  There's no embellishing the experience of cleaning out my closets or wandering for hours at the local mall.

It was while reading Stephen Wilke's post on his blog by that name that I realized the error of my ways, and that a revisit of my personal definition of vacation was in order.  Mistaking "time away" for "vacation" has become a personal habit, one I have ample opportunity to correct this year.  There's no excuse, no frenetic planning or hotel price comparisons to make.  I just need to decide to actually book it.

Sometimes a simple time off seems like a decent way to recharge, but every once in a while a true break from routine, familiarity, and especially location is the best thing I can do to get my groove back.

How many of these 11 excuses are sabotaging your idea of a great getaway?

Gorgeous Vintage Graphic from Hawaiian Days

Getting Started - Mining the Collective Brain Reserve First Step

In all the research I've done over the past few months, this post very nicely summarizes the touchpoints I believe are important to any business beginning a social media strategy. It not only gives the How, but an excellent case for Why.

That means I just had to point you to it:

9 Tips on Getting Started in Social Media

from F.A.D.S. (The Fight Against Destructive Spin)  Don't you love that name?

Mining the Collective Brain Reserve (Begin at the Beginning...)

I'm on a learning curve, and according to Todd Kashdan's book Curious, it's the reason I'm currently happy.

What's got my time and attention is social media, and if you're reading this blog, you've probably spent enough time online to become tired of the words.  Yes, the term is ubiquitous and by now, after everyone whose ever had to market online through a single tweet or facebook page has titled themselves a social media expert, I'll bet you're about ready to stop reading this post.

And that's ok.  You can stop reading.

But if your eyes have hit this sentence and you decide to continue, I'll tell you about my latest plan to have segments of this blog dedicated to what I learn about measuring and monitoring social media.

How did I decide to include that topic in a blog about ideas?  Because my worklife role now involves gathering social media metrics and like all things I become keenly interested in, I dive head first.  Especially a project I'm passionate about.  Especially a project that involves one of the Biggest Ideas to come along since television, and especially since the field is so wide open that there's exponential room for creativity. 

The mind reels with the possibilities.



So when you see my post titles include Mining the Collective Brain Reserve, you'll understand that I'll be writing about the progress of my self-imposed bootcamp.  I'm doing that in this Big Idea space because there are lots of folks like me out there, tasked with understanding, measuring, monitoring, creating, and listening.  And they want a plan, or they'd like to read about how others have done it.

I'm a fan of performing lots of research for anything I set out to do, so you'll get lots of links and pointers as I write out my journey.  It'll be a winding path, but here:  I've just taken the first steps.

First Link, First Step:   Radian6 says, is to Listen

Verb: Existence. Action. Occurrence. Happening.

Here's a thought.

I've so far been able to keep my resolutions for 2010 even though the year's been trying its best to do just that - best me.  Not happening.  I've been a busy girl, blogging, exercising, designing, creating, making, complimenting, reading, learning, writing, loving, and generally living.  It's been a good first month and a quarter, though there have been some challenges.

I'm not complaining.  I busy working on those ideas I'm always talking about.

As my favorite new author says, Life is a Verb.

I get it, Patti.  I do.