This week I’ve been on vacation at a resort near Playa del Carmen in Mexico. I like to say I’m not a big resort guy, as if that’s a bad thing to be, but in truth I increasingly love to spend time in the sun reading a good book—where better to do this than at a beach resort?
There are lots of things I like to do while traveling. Generally I need a good mix of relaxation and exploration, so in the context of a beach vacation I probably will go crazy if it’s just sitting in the sun the whole time. This week the exploration category has included diving, a cenote tour, and a cooking class. It’s mostly been delightful. Look at me! A traveler!
There are many ways to travel, and probably even more opinions about the right way to do so. Should you see as much as you can in the time you have, or really get to know one place? Should you follow the tourist track, or do everything you can to find the local flavor? Hotel or Airbnb? Concierge or Airbnb Experience? Family trip vs. friends trip? Partner time? Solo adventure?
This trip: one place, a bit of tourist and a bit of local, hotel, Airbnb Experience, partner. Emily and I travel very well together—we both like exploration and relaxation, mostly in the same ways, but with just enough divergence to pull each other into enjoyable new experiences. She’s also firmly of the opinion that you don’t need to—in a spiritual sense—“earn” your vacations to enjoy them, or even go on them. This is a pretty healthy attitude that I’ve historically struggled to adopt, so I appreciate the unapologetic way she wears it.
Here’s what I mean: for some reason, when it comes to vacation, I feel a sort of internal restlessness that says I need to work my ass off and accomplish a bunch of shit in the run-up to one, or else I won’t be able to fully kick back on it. That relaxation and exploration are a privilege. That without effort, I don’t deserve them.
To be clear, I want to make money and intentionally take time off from my day job, and have that money and time fund my travels. I don’t want anyone doing it for me, and I also recognize not everyone has the ability to earn enough money or time (or both) for travel. What I’m talking about is the story some of us—not everyone has this problem—feel compelled to tell to ourselves so that we can feel good about taking a little R&R (R&E in my case). In some ways, it’s understandable and even valid. In others, it seems like a solid jump-off point to rail on capitalism. Regardless, much like contending with any invisible force that governs your behavior, it takes an internal negotiation to find balance.
, who writes and runs #1000wordsofsummer, touched on this dynamic a bit in a recent article on tackling a small problem in the later stages of writing her novel while abroad:“Then I left on this trip to Europe. It is a vacation, but I have been working every day in one way or another. I like to work. I like to write a little bit at least or do some edits every day and then I can relax and go out in the world. I enjoy a gentle hum of always thinking of these projects that I love. So I do not feel that I am betraying the vacation by working if it allows me to enjoy it in the end.”
Betrayal! What a great word to use. This is really interesting, because to me it sounds like she actually enjoys her vacations even more if she’s able to put a little work in while on them. For a person that employs a strict separation of church and state between work and vacation, this sounds more foreign than any place I’ve visited. Maybe, MAYBE it has something to do with the fact that she likes to work, and that work vibrates with a gentle hum because it represents projects that she loves.
Generally speaking, I actually quite like to work too. After all, I am writing this on vacation. But I even like work work, my day job of solving tricky UX problems for products that greatly impact society—well, when the company I do it at is in a stable place, anyway. In theory the travel I embark on actually improves my work (and my relationship to it) when I’m invested in what I’m doing and care about the projects that fill my time. It’s the slog of work that doesn’t produce a spark, that most of us deal with most of the time, that’s hard to reconcile with this internal need I feel to PRODUCE in order to RELAX. Admittedly that’s where I’ve been lately, so that’s probably why I’m angsty on this particular beach read.
Oh well. Probably time to just shut up, get a drink, and enjoy myself. That’s enough musing on my relationship to work for one trip.
Vacation Victor out.
Thanks for sharing this Victor and your other posts. You won’t be surprised to hear that I process this topic as the intention/debate/conflict/harmony between “doing” and “being.”
And, by the way, the pictures of Vacation Victor and Partner Emily are great!