I always find when I come from holidays (in fact even before I get home I find) I’m planning new things.  I might think of a new layout for the furniture in my office or home.  I might develop a new way to approach a certain client, or situation.  I might decide to repaint the living room to get a whole new perspective on things.  And that’s really what holidays do for me - in terms of my personal growth, they give me a change of perspective.

This year, when we came home from holidays, my husband said it had been like having “time off from the recession”.  Because the recession is one thing - and it’s effects are very real.  But the media “moan-fest” that goes on about it is entirely another thing.  It’s like a big bandwagon all of its own.  It’s a huge “ain’t it awful” circus that feeds itself on people’s misery.  It’s a way of looking at it.

 

So time off from that was a real treat.  And y’know what?  The world still turned while we were away; the economists still wrung their hands; the unemployed were still unemployed; those in difficulty were still in difficulty - but the ones reporting it seemed to be having the time of their lives picking over the troubles of everyone else.  That’s just their way of looking at it.

 

I’m very thankful that I had the opportunity to get away from it all for a few weeks.  The situation didn’t change, but my view of it did.  And that’s the point.  When we look at some event in our lives that is causing us difficulty, it can be hard to separate the event from our reaction to it.  What’s really happening is that a certain event takes place - then - we have a reaction to it.  If we get to take a step back, a pause, a holiday - and choose a different reaction, then we have power over the outcome.

 

For example, if someone loses their job, that is a very real event.  It has effects and consequences.  But whether you deal with it as (i) a disaster from which you will never recover, or (ii) an unexpected event which may force you to look at things in a new way - is up to you.  One will give you a miserable, self-defeating attitude, the other will give you a chance for personal development (albeit not looked for), to look at where your strengths lie and present yourself in a new way.  Losing your job is the fact.  How you deal with it is where your power lies.

 

It brings me back to the benefit of holidays.  It gives us that break, that pause, in which to look at things in a new way.  Happy holidays!