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Here’s how I used to spend my leave before I saw the light
If you take a break from work, rest.
As promised, I’m back. I had taken a long overdue leave from work, and I must say that this time around I am well-rested, and rejuvenated. And this is because, after a very long time, I finally learned the secret to a perfect leave.
If you take a break from work, rest. And by rest, I mean sleep longer than you normally do, and have days when you simply lounge around, doing absolutely nothing, contributing zero to nation building. Kenya has a population of 55.34 million, surely, the rest can do the nation building on your behalf for a couple of days. Dare to be unapologetically lazy, and your body and mind will thank you. And yes, ignore those motivational speakers that put to shame people who watch TV in their spare time instead of doing an online course or practicing breathing techniques...
For a long time, I would spend my leave doing things I generally had no time to do, thanks to work (at least that’s what I told myself), such as doing thorough cleaning around the house, visiting relatives that I like or commencing on a mentally exhausting project. If I had money to spare, I would throw in a brief holiday just before my leave was over, and by the time I reported back to work, I would be as tired as a donkey, very ready to go on leave again. You know that feeling, right?
The irony is that even though holidays are meant to be relaxing, a time to put behind your everyday worries and stresses, it can be exhausting and actually stress-inducing. To begin with, traveling is tiring, and when you get to your destination, it takes some effort to adjust to your new environment, which might affect your sleep, not to mention adjusting to the rich food those buffet tables groan with. If you plan to take a holiday, take it soon after your leave commences to allow yourself a few days at home to recover from your holiday before you return to work.
But I digress, I was telling you how I used to spend my leave before I saw the light. Those were the days when I did not know how to relax; I felt as if I was doing something wrong if I just sat, doing nothing, and would keep myself busy doing a variety of chores until nightfall – arranging a wardrobe in disarray, ridding ceiling corners of cobwebs, sweeping and weeding outside, even washing the gate... I blame it on socialisation.
We were brought up to believe that we had to be productive all the time. In fact, in my time, it was a cardinal sin to be idle, it did not matter whether you had done all the important chores, our parents expected us to keep ourselves busy and would hit the roof if they found you just seated. As for oversleeping, according to our parents, it was an offense worth a jail sentence. “Huwezi tafuta kitu ya kufanya?!” was a common question which you can translate to your mother tongue for impact. I remember my childhood, and sometimes I can’t believe how calm I remain when I sometimes walk into a house that looks like a pigsty, yet my children are lying on the seats with no care in the world, oblivious to the chaos around them. How times have changed.