Vacation Insights
OR: why you should run away from at least some of your problems.
Novel insights don’t always require new data, but can arise from interpreting existing data in a new way. In fact, given how much data science has at the current moment, one could argue that the ceiling on human understanding has more to do with a lack of novel perspectives than a shortage of information.
Why are novel perspectives the restraint? Because collecting new data is often easier than re-evaluating the old. Not logistically, of course. Generating new data requires many steps and involves many moving parts, whereas for re-examination of existing data, all you need is a fist to rest your chin on or a window to look out of.
But re-examination is difficult conceptually and socially. Existing interpretations have a way of obscuring new ones, thanks in part to the confirmation bias; and new interpretations have a hard time breaking through when many people are invested in the status quo.1 For example, the notion that psychiatry is bogus must contend with thousands of pharmaceutical industry employees, trillions of dollars in annual profits, and the public's deep-seated (and well-founded) faith in medication for treating pain and illness.2
What does any of this have to do with vacation? Well, to me, the observation that vacation tends to reduce anxiety is an example of meaningful data hiding in plain sight. I believe this seemingly mundane fact illustrates several key principles about the mind in general, and anxiety in particular, that have thus far been neglected or misunderstood.
Let’s begin with a definition of anxiety. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) describes anxiety as “anticipation of future threat.” Using Rob’s Measure and Motivate framework, we could say that the purpose of anxiety is to measure future threats or opportunities and motivate preparatory action. So, if we perceive that tomorrow’s test will be hard, or date will be attractive, then we study and shower, respectively.
Studies show that vacation tends to decrease anxiety and other bad things. (Glad we had psychologists for that.) Of course, this isn’t always the case. Sometimes vacation increases anxiety or changes its complexion. Many people from my parents’ generation have told me that honeymoons used to be quite the trial. In those days, couples typically didn’t live together—or have sex—before marriage, so two weeks alone with sex suddenly on the agenda was occasionally a bit much. Also, for many people, the loneliest moment of their life happened on a trip.
Generally, though, people come back from vacation feeling better than when they left. Nobody finds anything strange about this. In fact, here we have an existing bit of data that hardly anyone has gone through the trouble of explaining. The informal thought goes: Our daily lives are demanding, so naturally it’s nice to get a break. Plus, in addition to the absence of responsibility and pressure, vacation has positive—present—aspects as well: good food, dazzling sights, interesting people, unique experiences, and so on. Who wouldn’t be happier?
So, some effects of vacation seem to add up. But others do not. For example, the benefits of vacation linger for a while after a person returns. They might not linger for all that long, but wouldn’t we expect anxiety to return immediately? Actually, given that responsibilities have piled up in the meantime, wouldn’t we expect anxiety to be immediately worse than when the person left? Instead, the time off seems to provide something of a buffer, short-lived though it may be. We’d find this odd if we were not so accustomed to it.3
Furthermore, what can be said about that tragic sequence in which we promise to arrange our lives differently when we return from vacation—get up early to exercise, put our foot down with our boss, journal every weekend—and then slowly but surely watch our old failures and anxieties reclaim their former positions?
When it comes to vacation, I think there is more room for surprise and curiosity than we might initially presume. So let’s get to it.
1. Content ⇄ Process
Ok, our first order of business is to sketch out the precise relationship of the mind and reality. No big deal, right? Actually, we’ll only tackle a part of it, but an important one.
Recall that from an evolutionary perspective the mind contains many specialized systems, much like the body comprises the limbic, digestive, and circulatory systems. Each of these mental and bodily systems serves distinct functions, working together for the overall benefit of the organism. The mind includes systems for mating, finding food, orientating and mapping, and so on.
Each of these systems is designed to pay attention to certain aspects of the internal and external environment. My mating system attends to T&A, for example, whereas my balance system attends to the distribution of my weight.
If we refer to the active program(s) of the mind as process and the data they interpret as content, then we can say there is a bidirectional relationship between process and content. Process is influenced by content and vice versa. For example, let’s say you’re walking along the street, minding your business, when suddenly the smell of fried chicken hits your nose. You manage to keep walking, but this smell has now activated your hunger system, making you see the next store—a CVS—as containing rows of delicious, carby snacks (instead of rows of medications, which is how you typically see it). The hunger program (process) was activated by the smell of fried chicken (content) which influenced the interpretation of CVS (content) in a hungry way (process).4
You might be wondering, again, what any of this has to do with vacation. Well, it might be said that people like you and me live a “To-Do List” life. To-Doing is the superstructure of our lives, which we cannot escape. Even if we do it poorly, we’re still imprisoned by it because we recognize how far we are behind our peers. If we do it well, we’re never quite satisfied, and stretch for more. I have some ideas about why this is our mode of life. A few clients have also recommended 4,000 Weeks.
The point is, there’s a real hammer-looking-for-a-nail aspect to this mode of living. I’m sure many of you would admit that during particularly busy periods, almost every activity of life makes it onto your list, even “sex” and “relax.”
Now, the To-Do mode of life recruits something akin to the anxiety system. When active, this system scans the environment for more things to do in the same way that the hunger system scans the environment for food. A major implication of this is that people will have a much easier time ridding themselves of the negative emotions of having a long To-Do list by abandoning the list than completing it. This is partly because abandonment is easier, yes, but also because when you’re in the To-Do list mood, you find more things to do. The threshold of what “needs to be done” is lowered by doing stuff. And this alters reality in a way that makes continued anxiety more likely.
When I’m in a To-Do frenzy, for exampe, I regard the spotty caulking on my kitchen quarter-round as critical to fix. But when I’m relaxed—perhaps because I am recently back from vacation—I hardly notice it.
Other idiosyncrasies of getting stuff done tend to swell the list, too. Sometimes, addressing one item creates two. E.g. “take car to shop” becomes “get quotes for brake replacement” and “take car to brake replacement appointment.” I am always reminded of the Hydra in these instances, the mythical serpent that spawned two heads whenever one was cut off.
Part of the explanation, then, for why people are less anxious after returning from a vacation—even though they “should” be more anxious because their To-Do list has grown in the interim—is that they aren’t seeing the world through a To-Do lens. On vacation, other programs were active; the anxious one needs some time to get up and running.
No doubt you are saying to yourself—ok, sure, but I do need to get stuff done and I do feel less anxious when I’m able to cross enough items off my list. I’m with you there. My point is that the very process of addressing the list alters the content of what needs doing, which accounts for the mixture of futility and frustration many people feel in their task-centric lives. Or, as Marilynne Robinson would say, the “joyless urgency.”
2. The “Shampoo Effect”
The bidirectionality of process and content provides part of the answer for why vacation takes a while to sink into and emerge from. The other part of the answer is tolerance. But tolerance is a boring word, so let’s use the “shampoo effect” instead.
The shampoo effect refers to the tendency of hair to lather much more easily during the second application. I’ve also been told—though I cannot confirm—that the first beer on the morning after a day of heavy drinking likewise goes “straight to the head.”
A related way of thinking about this comes courtesy of a friend: “New shit is better than old shit,” he’ll say. In other words, the third time we receive an email from our boss at 7am is much worse than the first and much better than the seventh. Similarly, the perpetually-broken step or leaky faucet can make us clinically depressed in one fell instant, as it reminds us of weeks, months, and sometimes years of not doing anything about it.
What’s going on here? The traditional story about tolerance is that as we continue to consume something, the amount that is needed to produce the same effect increases. As a freshman, we got buzzed on a single beer; as a senior, we required a six-pack. The opposite seems to happen for the crappiness in our life, though. The first time our boss sends us an early morning email, we tolerate it with grace. The tenth time, we melt into a puddle. I’m really not sure how to understand this. If anyone has thoughts, please share them in the comments.
In any case, the important takeaway is that for both alcohol and early morning emails, tolerance can be reset by an interval. Vacation can be that interval.
This explains why the same irritation before vacation might send you into a rampage, whereas after vacation you might manage it with some grace. However, the ramp-up to your former levels of intolerance will be much quicker than the first time around.5
3. Willpower is Over-Rated
The most important insight skulking around the discussion so far is that the environment, context, circumstance, or situation is far more powerful in determining how humans feel, and therefore behave, than willpower, self-control, personality, or resolve.
The role of circumstance helps to explain our optimism on the way home from vacation. As we sit on the tarmac, waiting for a gate to open, our projection of the future benefits from the success of the past week—why can’t we carry this good momentum forward? Our problems seem infinitely manageable. Of course, the strong current of environment also explains why we are pulled back into the same old dynamics. If our failures or feelings were unique or inherent to us—part of our personality or personal history—then presumably they would show up on vacation. When they don’t, they are likely part of our circumstance.
So, unless vacation’s positive momentum results in structural changes to a person’s life, it is likely to fade away. Trust me, I’ve seen this time and time again in my practice. People don’t feel better until they find the right relationship, the right job, the right friends, the right city, and so on. Suffering well is an important skill to have, since nobody ever has everything at once; but when it comes to a difficult job, for example, a client’s energy is typically better spent finding a new one than trying to feel differently about the current one.
Put simply, willpower should be used to change circumstances, not responses to circumstances. And it must be applied as far upstream as possible. By “upstream,” I mean close to the source of the problem. For example, let’s say you’re in the grocery store and craving ice-cream. But you’re also trying to eat healthier these days. You have two options. The first is not to buy the ice-cream. The second is to buy the ice-cream and rely on your willpower later, once the ice-cream is already in your freezer. Which do you think has more chance of success?
As it turns out, there’s something more upstream still. You could eat before you go to the grocery store and thus reduce your craving. Borrowing language from the first section, we could say that this “diminishes the likelihood that the hunger system will activate and influence perception.”6
I try to make this point to clients all the time. “Willpower isn’t that powerful compared to circumstances,” I say, “and so when you think about using willpower, use it to change your circumstances.” Some clients, after this little speech, delete Instagram right then and there.
Anyway, the most common thing I find myself thinking and saying in my work is—“Nope, it’s not you. I’d feel the same way in your situation. So change the situation.”
4. The Mind Never Rests
Humans talk about all the time about being happy, and definitions of what that means vary. A common foundation, though, is a sense of carelessness, contentment, or peace. The stories that end with “and they rode off into the sunset” or “they lived happily ever after” press on this ancient desire of ours to stop.
The mind, however, was not designed to rest. A brain that rested on its laurels would be beaten by one that was never satisfied. To use technical terms, happiness is not an evolutionarily stable strategy; it can be invaded and outcompeted by—well, by all the stuff that’s listed in the DSM: anxiety, rumination, jealousy, negative self-talk, and so on. Who cares that the byproduct is a bad experience for the organism? Evolution is like a CEO that only cares about the bottom line—not employees’ “work-life balance.”
Since we are destined (or doomed?) to never be content for long, the best we can do is influence the kind and intensity of the problems the mind chews on. Regardless of the environment, the mind will scan for problems and opportunities, but the result of this scanning will very much depend on what the mind finds. Even vacation, if you think about it, is more often a shifting of problems and opportunities than an absence of them.
Let me provide an example. For the past fifteen years, a group of friends and I have competed in a pond hockey tournament. Before the trip, my mind is occupied with the typical daily stress: Do I have enough articles in the pipeline? How’s my client schedule the week I get back? Should I change the air pressure in my tires? Did I ever get back to that friend about dinner? During the tournament, my mind turns to the problems of competition and nostalgia. How can we beat this team? How has my relationship with my brothers and friends changed? How have I changed, and has it been for the better?
After the trip—and usually a gold medal, ahem—I come back home and fret over my To-Do list.
On vacation, we don’t fret over our To-Do list even though the list is growing and we aren’t doing anything about it. In fact, it’s because we can’t do anything about it that we pay it no mind. I can’t do my taxes in Hawaii. I can’t take out my trash in Vancouver. I can’t cook that new recipe my friend sent me while I’m staying in a hotel in France. So my mind passes over it.
As I argued in Straightlining OCD, the mind asks two basic questions of what it encounters: Is this a problem? If so, can I do something about it?7 If the answer to either is No, the mind moves on.
So, why is vacation enjoyable?
If you ask someone why vacation is enjoyable, they’ll likely blink their eyes, privately conclude that you’re an idiot, and respond: “It just is.” Leveraging the above, though, we can provide a more specific answer.
First, by changing the environment, vacation tends to change the process—program—our mind is running. The mind never stops, but because we can’t fix the leaky faucet until we’re home, the mind contemplates other things. Out of sight, out of mind. Meanwhile, when our mental program changes, our interpretation of content changes with it. We sift the world differently, often in more pleasing ways than when we’re at home. All the while, our tolerance for annoyances back home is being reset.
Others aspects of well-being come into the picture when we take a harder look at vacation. Many of the inevitable tradeoffs of life, which complicate every choice we make, are absent on vacation. In our everyday lives, we have to weigh an hour of video games against an hour of exercise. We must pit a croissant against broccoli. These short- vs. long-term tradeoffs are largely solved on vacation, in part because we can’t do the long-term thing—fix the leaky faucet—and in part because, well, it’s vacation! Live a little.
When vacation is torturous, it’s often because we fall into tradeoffs anyway. Do we run around all day, seeing and learning as much as we can, or do we sleep in and take it easy? I swear, some people’s To-Do list on vacation is longer than their To-Do list at home. Should we take a bunch of photos, or appreciate the moment? These are some of the dilemmas that cause people to need a vacation from their vacation (although the main one is undoubtedly other people).
Total Eclipse of the Truth
In the beginning of this post, I said that new perspectives are obscured by existing ones, especially when many are invested in the existing perspective. Much of the material above conflicts with the (stated or implied) core beliefs of clinical psychology, perhaps none more so than the wisdom of running away from one’s problems. Yes, a person can—and sometimes should—run away from their problems, but your average therapist wouldn’t be caught dead saying that. The whole point of therapy is to “work through” stuff, not back down from it.
Yet it’s worth keeping in mind that one of the more common solutions to problems, over human history, has been to move on—whether in response to weather, sparse game, a hostile tribe, disease, or a break with the community.8
For example, Herman Lehmann, a Texan boy who was captured by Apaches in 1870 and lived with them for several years, at one point killed a medicine man—a big no-no. Do you think Herman stuck around to “develop ego strength” or “learn to manage conflict”? Hell no! He fled and eventually took up with the Comanches.
Clinical psychology has overstated the value of “sitting with” and “working through” problems, mainly as part of its understandable effort to help clients grow, mature, and ultimately feel better. Don’t get me wrong, there are many positives to perseverance, but there are also costs. Some things that don’t kill you nevertheless make you weaker. And the biggest cost might be opportunity cost. What aren’t you learning, enjoying, experiencing as you continue to beat your head against the wall? Sometimes you have to know when to throw in the towel and get out of Dodge.
Getting Out of This Article
Before vacation, I routinely work myself into a frenzy to accomplish a certain amount of my To-Do list, then go on vacation and stop caring. When I come back, I continue to not care for a few days, before anxiety finally finds my throat. What does this prove? First, that I was indeed over-reacting beforehand. But I sort of knew that, didn’t I? The second thing it proves is that even though I knew I was over-reacting, I couldn’t get away from my feelings until I got away from the situation causing them.
Clinical psychology wants people to resolve their problems gracefully and healthily. That’s admirable and occasionally makes sense. But much of the time, I tell clients: “Look, I’m happy to support you through this, but I don’t think you’ll feel much differently until you’re in a different situation.” In other words, move on. Live to fight another day.
Freshly back from vacation, we can see our lives clearly. We can almost watch the old dynamics re-establish themselves, the old feelings take up their former abodes. For a few days only, we identify each variable in the equation that produces our status quo mood.
That is when we must strike, when that iron is hot. Because after a few days, everything will become such a convoluted mess again—and our willpower is oh-so-underwhelming.
Then again, not all is lost. Soon enough, another vacation will come around and give us another moment of clairvoyance. But the cycle does leave me wondering what it says about our lives that we rely on vacation so much.
A much better treatment of these ideas can be found in Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
Also, shouldn’t there be contrast effects? Having just experienced that life can be easy and fun, shouldn’t a return to the daily grind be that much more difficult? Yet the positive effects of vacation still linger longer than they “should.”
Note that instead of the smell of fried chicken, the data could have been the food levels in your stomach, i.e., internal data.
The technical term for this is rapid reacquisition.
Feel free to have a look at the “Temptation Resistance Techniques” section in What To Do With Emotions, Part I.
I’m using problem here, for simplicity’s sake, but the same goes for opportunity.
As Jared Diamond writes in The World Until Yesterday, “among nomadic hunter-gatherers and other mobile groups, disputes within a group can be settled just by the group dividing so that disputants move apart. That option is difficult for settled village farmers…and even more difficult for us Western citizens tied to our jobs and houses.” (93)
Is this a problem? If so, can I do something about it?⁷ If the answer to either is No, the mind moves on.A great piece of advice.
I´ll try my hand at explaining why tolerance for crappy things in life works in reverse, ie the tenth crappy occurance is worse than the first. I think it has to do with the meaning we assign to the crap. If something happens once, it´s easy to think of it as a one-off: "yeah, it´s bad but it´s only going to be this one time so I can deal with it." As further occurances pile up we´re confronted by evidence that the situation is unlikely to improve, a conceptual shift that can edge us towards despair. It´s like going to the doctor and being told that we have an incurable illness. Anyway, that´s my take.