Successful Family Vacations: How to Avoid the Potential Emotional Pitfalls
by www.Sedona.com
As summer approaches, many families are gearing up for their yearly rite of passage: the family vacation. You’ve saved all year, planned out the details down to who will be sitting next to whom in the car or on the plane, and you’ve packed sunscreen, cameras and enough snacks to last you for a month.
So why are you feeling so nervous?
Family vacations, though ultimately great to relieve stress and gain some cherished memories, can bring on a lot of pressure. There is the expectation that you must have a perfect time or somehow you have failed. But when traveling with a family -- one that normally gives itself space and then finds itself confined to one hotel room or camper -- “perfect” may be impossible.
And the sooner you accept that -- and embrace it -- the better your vacation will be.
“People are people whether they are at home or on the road,” says Hale Dowskin, CEO and director of training of Sedona Training Associates. “If you expect people to magically change just because they are on vacation you will be disappointed.”
So what can you do to make your family vacation a successful one?
- Get the kids involved. You can do this from the very beginning planning stages by letting kids weigh in on where to go, all the way down to deciding where to eat for dinner. Kids will have a harder time complaining about a vacation they helped to put together.
- Focus on the positive. You are away from home, away from work and spending time together. How bad can it be?
“I would recommend that you make a game out of finding things about the vacation and each other that you can agree with or approve of during your trip,” Dwoskin says. “We all have a tendency to look for the negative and miss the positive even when we are with people we love in a beautiful place.”
- Keep a routine. This is especially important if you have younger kids, as they’ll still need their regular naps, mealtimes and favorite toys to avoid getting cranky.
- Release, release, and release some more. The Sedona Method is one item that you should bring with on every vacation, and fortunately it doesn’t take up any space in your suitcase. Whenever you feel things getting tense, remember the principles of The Sedona Method and let your negative feelings go.
“Keep releasing on anything that does not go the way you have planned,” Dwoskin says. “If you allow yourself to flow with what happens each day you will enjoy the vacation a lot more.”
And remember, kids can use The Sedona Method too.
- Stay in the present. Vacation is NOT the time to be worrying about things you need to do when you get home.
“If you find yourself thinking about what you left undone at home or what you have to do when you get home, stop in this moment and let go and refocus on where you are and what you are doing now,” Dwoskin says.
You will only be on this family vacation once, after all, so NOW is the time to enjoy it.
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