A Vacation Won’t Fix Your Problems
noticing beauty in the moments you take for granted might.
Unwind is a space where I write about things that matter in life. The ones that hold meaning, but we often lose sight of them while being surrounded by chaos. I explore the messy, interesting parts about growing up, embracing peace, dealing with failure, and much more. If any of this resonates, I would love for you to join me on this journey. I am beyond grateful for every tap on this subscribe button!
When I was a kid, the idea of vacation felt magical. Getting to explore new places with your loved ones and convincing parents to get you to eat all your favourite kinds of junk food. Back then, life was not complicated, and vacations came without pressure. The pressure to cram every attraction into an itinerary. The pressure to feel productive and ready to face the world once it’s over. As kids, we find joy even in the ordinary because we aren’t yet carrying the weight of adult responsibilities. The simplest moments feel extraordinary through a child’s eyes, making every vacation an adventure in its own right.
Things have changed now that I have grown up. I look forward to summer as an excuse to slow down in my otherwise busy life. There are seasons when I am counting the days to the weekend, or dreaming about my next holiday, because living in the now is as difficult as catching the wind. All of us have let our vacations become the excuse to continue living an unfulfilling life at some point. We have let ourselves believe that a vacation can be the solution to our exhaustion. Sometimes, it truly is. Most often though, we end up stepping back into the grind, extremely overwhelmed once the vacation is over.
Think of it this way. You are a fish swimming in a pool of contaminated water, struggling to make it through your days. Suddenly, someone shifts you into a new pool. It has water as clear as a crystal, and you feel like you can finally breathe well. You have the absolute best time of your life swimming in this new pool. But then it’s time for you to go back home. To start swimming in the contaminated water again. You struggle to breathe once again. Your days of swimming in the new pool become a mere distant memory you wish to relive someday. Your day-to-day life is the pool you are currently swimming in, possibly contaminated with negativity, self-doubt, competition and constant pressure. The new pool is your vacation.
When I say that a vacation won’t solve your problems, I am talking about real issues. The issue is not having a minute to sit with yourself when life gets tough. The issue of doomscolling your way through chaos. The issue of going to bed at the end of the day, dreading what the next day would bring. These are the things that truly matter when your goal is to build a life where the water you swim in every day feels clear and nourishing. A vacation may offer a refreshing change of scenery, but real contentment comes from not needing to dive into a different pool only to experience a sense of purity.
When we build a life we don’t need to escape from, a vacation becomes a tool to enhance it further. A good life is not free of problems. The challenges will exist. But what matters is how long you decide to sit with them without taking action. With intentional effort, you can focus on enhancing exactly the things that keep your mind from growing numb to the present. These things are:
A calm nervous system.
A well-balanced routine that involves some kind of work (a job, a business, studies, or even running a household), but also has a life outside of that work.
Room for rest without guilt.
A community, with a very important realisation of how much value these people add to your life.
Then come the enhancers, which bring in anticipation. A project. An upcoming trip. A long-awaited meetup or catch-up with a loved one.
The solution to all your problems does not lie in a vacation. It lies in the exact moments you take for granted. The ones you casually spend doomscrolling on your phone. Or worrying about a future that’s yet to come.
Let this be a reminder to pay attention to the parts of your life that no longer serve you and work on changing them, rather than relying on a vacation to offer a temporary escape. Focus on the ordinary, the meaningful, and the moments that quietly make up your life. Because when your everyday begins to feel fulfilling, a vacation becomes a beautiful addition—not something you’re constantly waiting to be rescued by.
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Life cannot be escaped from, not with good things like vacations, and not with bad ones like alcohol. The thing we do to attempt to escape life, it becomes part of that life we are trying to escape, and then, suddenly, it becomes meaningless. There is no way around designing a life we aren't trying to run from. Life first, and then things that fit into it. This is the way to harmony. Thank you for this discussion, Mansi.
never really had a proper vacation to compare this to, which maybe makes the "life first, then things that fit into it" point land even harder for me. there's no escape hatch I've been relying on, so the only real question left is whether the everyday itself feels worth staying in. loved it! 💗