Homework on Holiday
The warm water lapped at my ankles. I wiggled my toes in the fine, white sand. I stared out at the unbelievable blue water, stretching endlessly in every direction. I savored every moment of that glorious hour. Which was good, because I’d only allotted myself a single hour.
When I had submitted my posters to the WPA conference in Hawaii, I thought I would finish my dissertation in the next couple of months. But when April came around, I was still working frantically. I thought I was almost done, and so I barely went to the conference. Besides my own posters, I only allowed myself one other presentation at the conference. I spent the rest of the time holed up in my hotel room working on my dissertation.
My roommate came and went. He went to the conference. He went to the beach. He went to the volcanoes. I barely noticed him, beyond a vague annoyance that he made it harder to concentrate.
When I originally decided to work on my dissertation in Hawaii, I thought I would be done in just a few more days. In actuality, it took me another two months to finish my dissertation. If I had known how much longer it would take me to finish my dissertation, I would have just taken a holiday. Instead, I wasted that precious time in Hawaii and I haven’t made it back there since.
On later trips, I did the opposite. I took work with me and never took it out of the suitcase. But I thought about it regularly and felt guilty about not doing it. Therefore, the work tainted my whole vacation, even though I didn’t get any of it done. After a few trips like that, I learned not to take work with me on my holidays.
Research shows that taking a break from work increases creativity (West, 2000). Many scientists have had famous insights when they were on holiday or doing something besides work: Telsa figured out alternating current when he was out for a walk, and Poincare solved a mathematical problem when stepping onto a bus. Moreover, vacations reduce stress and improve health (Chikani, Reading, Gunderon, & McCarty, 2005; de Bloom, Geurts, Taris, Sonnentag, de Weerth, & Kompier, 2010).
Lately, I’ve been defining my holiday as beginning and ending when I am at my destination. Therefore, I sometimes work while traveling. For example, I might read a paper on the plane. But once I am at my destination, I don’t do any of the work I brought with me until I’ve left the destination and am headed home again. This allows me to fully immerse myself in my holiday, without any guilt.
I also make an exception for email. When on holiday, I check my email every couple of days, to see if there is anything I need to reply to immediately. Note that these emails are not work that I brought with me and planned to do something about. They do not hang out at the back of my mind all of the time. I don’t feel guilty about not doing that work, because I don’t know what that work is until I check my email. And when I do check for emails, I deliberately chose not to work on most of them.
I put them off until my holiday is over. My advice to you:- Don’t take homework with you on vacation. Either you will do the work and it will ruin your vacation, or (more likely) you won’t do the work and it will taint your vacation anyway.
- You can check your email occasionally while on vacation, but only if you are able to deliberately choose to not do most of the work that comes in.
- You can do specific work while traveling to and from your destination, but once you are there, just focus on your vacation. The main benefits of the vacation require that you relax and have fun!
References
Chikani, V., Reading, D., Gunderson, P., & McCarty, C. A. (2005). Vacations improve mental health among rural women” The Wisconsin Rural Women’s Health Study. Wisconsin Medical Journal, 104, 20 – 23.
de Bloom, J., Geurts, S. A. E., Taris, T. W., Sonnentag, S., de Weerth, C., & Kompier, M. A. J. (2010). Effects of vacation from work on health and well-being: Lots of fun, quickly gone. Work & Stress: An International Journal of Work, Health & Organizations, 24, 196-216.
West, M. (2000). State of the art: Creativity and innovation at work.Psychologist, 13, 460-464.
Kimberly A. Barchard is the Director of the Interactive Measurement Group. She is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at UNLV. She joined UNLV in 2001 after obtaining her MA and PhD in Psychometrics. She works to empower students and colleagues to accomplish their personal and professional goals, particularly through the development of leadership, communication, and research skills.