Take a Mental Vacation to Avoid Stress
February 28, 2010 by Kela Price
Filed under Modern "Me" Time
Last week I had the best vacation in Italy! I visited the cafes and museums, had a fabulous time at a few fashion shows and enjoyed the company of an old friend that I had not seen since high school. We decided to reconnect in Italy because we both have always wanted to go there. On our first night there we dined at Centrale, a beautiful, hip, chic restaurant/lounge in Venice. The food was amazing! I had a succulent parmesean farfalle pasta with chicken and mushrooms that was to die for…yummy! My friend had the spaghetti carbonara and a glass of white wine. Afterward, we decided to return to our hotel in order to rest up for the festivities on the following day. Okay, people, I didn’t literally go to Italy last week, but I did take a mental vacation there, and it was almost as nice as the real thing.
Mental vacations are like retreating to that quiet, relaxing place that your yoga instructor tells you to go to when you are doing the final relaxation pose at the end of every class. They are fun, free and can take you anywhere your imagination allows you to go. Mental vacations are a nice way for moms/stepmoms, working women and just about anyone to escape from the norm. I usually take my mental vacations during my “me” time in a relaxing bath with soft music playing. For those 3o minutes I am not mom, wife, business woman or counselor, and I don’t worry about the challenges of stepmamahood or motherhood. I allow myself to mentally escape to a place where I get to choose who goes along for the ride.
Next week, I think my business partner and very dear friend, Diane and I, will take a relaxing trip with our husbands to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. We could all use a couples only vacation right about now. If anyone else wants to join us, please let me know. The plane tickets, hotels, food, and activities are all FREE!
What about you, readers? Describe your ultimate mental vacation in the comments section below and win a brand new Sirius Sportster 5 XM Satellite Radio!
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Puerto Vallarta, we could really use that right now! Let’s see, white sand beaches, a good book in one hand and sipping on virgin strawberry dacquiri’s with our toes wiggling through the white sand. Ahh…the joy of a mental vacation! I dig it!!
Thanks for such a relaxing technique, it really does help to “get away” even if it is only for 30 minutes!
Di
I love doing this! I take what I call a “memory trip” each night before I go to sleep, and after a tough day of being a teacher, wife, and stepmom, it always relaxes me and sends me off to sweet dreams. I like to visualize a fun trip or memory from my past, and although I love perching myself poolside in Palm Springs or tuckin myself away in a cozy cabin in the Sierra Nevada, my favorite place to let my memory wander is my grandparents’ home.
This may not seem a typical place for a mental get-away, but I loved going to my grandparents’ house as a child, and it’s such a treat for my senses as I imagine the taste of the little Danish sandwiches my grandma made, or reminisce about the delicate aroma of her prized peonies. I visualize the dish of M&Ms she always set out, and can appreciate the intricately carved wooden sculptures my grandfather made that I hardly took note of as a child. In my mind, my grandparents’ piano still has the sheet music open to “Puff the Magic Dragon,” and when I sneak into my grandmother’s medicine cabinet, I can still catch the faint taste of her lipstick that I secretly sampled and the Chanel No. 5 I dabbed behind my ears–just the way I’d seen my grandmother do it so many times before.
My grandparents have been gone for several years now, but it’s still fun to let my mind wander back to a time when my life felt simpler, yet full of love, protection, and comfort.