No matter the career stage, we know traveling and hobbies can increase your enjoyment of life. However, engaging in stimulating leisure activities can also improve your performance. We can learn and engage with new people by traveling to new cities, countries, beaches, and mountains, attending museums and concerts, and joining clubs and service organizations.
This travel can improve our time management and organizational skills, and increase IQ and EQ, resulting in an improved perspective in leading and being strategic. Having hobbies reduces stress, introduces novel insights, and keeps us mentally sharp and socially connected. These hobbies can improve our game-planning, practice new ideas without fear, increase memory, and improve focus on details.
Recreation forces us to rest and also activate parts of our brains that typically remain dormant. We may gain calm and comfort while “getting away” from work to travel to new places or learn a long-term hobby, but the enjoyable benefits don’t mean you don’t plan to accept a new challenge. We appreciate the novelty of what our travel and hobby time provide.
When you travel, you can meet new people, try new restaurants, hear new dialects and languages, and operate in an environment that doesn’t have the comforts of home. Travel companions often create a unique dependent relationship. Realizing how you react to new situations and people gives you invaluable insight.
Hobbies are the games of life that we can enjoy individually and share with others. Being free to play gives us a mental escape that allows us to lose track of time. Much of our best learning as children was in the games we played alone or with our neighborhood friends. There were rules, everyone played hard, and the worst was when your mom called you home. You wanted to win, but not at the expense of losing your friend. We would try new ideas and methods, knowing that winning or losing didn’t matter. Being free to enjoy hobbies provides a mental escape that activates personal innovation and joy.
To prioritize increasing time for traveling and hobbies, you should create a strategic career plan that helps you identify your values, purpose, and vision of success related to personal and professional goals. You can also do a time audit and create a plan to find the time you need to refresh and recover. CareerTruth is the first career management platform focused on you, the individual, providing you with tools, exercises, and a community to continually evolve your plans as they relate to your values, purpose, vision, and goals across all the seasons of your career.
Yes, take the time to enjoy life. Hobbies and recreation provide a real advantage to your continuous growth, performance, and purpose in life.