Squishing suitcases, ticket terrors, passport panics, traffic traumas, and a million "are we there yet"s – never mind the vehicular vomiting along the way. And what about the athazagoraphobia? You know the one? It stalks you all the way there and nips at your heels for the first half of the holiday and has an unreasonable tendency to leap out and bite you when you least suspect its existence. Was the oven turned off? Did you lock the back door? You did give the neighbours the keys didn’t you? The cat wasn’t locked in the shed was it? Or are you going to find a desiccated corpse amongst the garden tools with the tell tale signs of desperation clawed on the door? A million and one terrors and "what ifs" taunt you every millisecond, playing tricks on your mind making you hyperventilate and hallucinate visualising all the atrocities you are going to find when you get home again. May be you are lucky and don’t suffer from this disorder. Remember it yet? It’s that atrocious thing called the fear of forgetting. And remind me – why are we doing this exactly?
Sun, sea, blue skies, and ice-cream – yyyuuummmmmy! Lounging around, enjoying a drink or two, room service, and NO phone calls – can’t fault it. Funny family pranks, squishy romance, handsome tanned faces, muscular shoulders, fab legs, oooh what a tight bum, mmmmm, and those sexy hands stroking m…..…..Sorry got a little carried away there! As I was saying, the air, the light, the space and time to breeeaaathe. Remembering of course to avoid hangovers, dodgy food, the trots, sunburn and family rows.
We return exhausted and with enough laundry to sink a battleship, and we need a holiday to get over the holiday. Why did we do that? Was it really worth it? Should we stay at home next time? It would certainly be much cheaper. When we have all the comforts of home – do we really need to go away?
Regardless of whether we stay at home or go away we all need time out to re-evaluate and recharge to give our real dreams that spark of life to keep them alive. Detaching us from our daily lives allows us to view the ‘challenges’ from the outside as well as encouraging introspection to assess what we really want from life. If we use our retreat time wisely, we gain valuable insights to fuel future choices making sure that we don’t get to the end of our years filled with regret and "if only"s. We remember to appreciate the little things like the glow of colour from a beautiful flower, the peace of a sunset as the day slows to a recumbent dedication to Somnus – the God of sleep. We rest and dream and drink in the breath of inspired living.
In short it is up to us to make the most of our summer time relaxation therapy – get your money’s worth, re-fuel, and allow the dreams to awaken. Come back full of enthusiasm, invigorated and ready to hit the ground running. Feeling strong means that we will make sure that all our choices are for the right reasons. We will remember too, to keep walking towards our goals created by our desires to live our dreams and fulfil our fantasies.
Now where were those hands? Mmmmm – ah yes. I remember …………
