Sit back and relax

This week I'm back at my parent's house. As a vacation goes, it is not too bad. I've had to move a few pieces of furniture around and go pick up an exchange student Yuri. (She is from Japan) This is my first vacation this summer and it made me think about taking a break. Simply put, how often we take vacation time. (or Holiday time, if you're British)

One of the more infamous statistics I remember is that Dentists and Morticians have the highest suicide rate of all professions. We are measuring taking your life by profession? How stressed-out are we as a society? Okay, I can see Morticians. When you are around death all the time, it may start looking friendly. But Dentists? The only reason you should be depressed as a dentist is if you are tired of the tedious work. If that's the case... take some time off.

In this country children get about three months of vacation for summer, about three weeks for Winter and one week for Spring break. How many vacation days do you get? I know, it is more important that you are working because you have those things called "Responsibilities". At the same time people are not taking time for themselves and now their lives are their jobs. I can't think of many people that get any more mello when they do their job. It is more likely that you get stressed like the rest of us.

Most people I know only take a few days off and cope with the rest of the stress by hitting the local watering hole. Why do we do this to ourselves? What I propose is this... if you can take the time off for vacation, Do! If you don't get time for a vacation... work hard and play hard. Live it up because it is the last chance you will get. If you're doing this right then you may see a decrease of certain activities during the day (i.e. road rage, compulsive coffee drinking, eating at odd hours of the day, and grinding your teeth)