As a fan of Dr Rangan Chatterjee I bought his latest book, Happy Mind, Happy Life. The book is all about finding happiness everyday and Dr Chatterjee includes exercises in the book to help change your perspective. One of the exercise is taking a daily holiday. This should be an activity that allows you to reflect on life and gain solitude.

As a guide he suggests doing it alone, without your smartphone and in silence. Suggested activities are either moving holidays, such as a run, walk, swim or cycle. A still holiday could be meditation, journalling or breathwork.

I decided to do this for a week, varying the activity each day to see what I found most productive and easy to fit into my life.

Monday:

A thoughtful present of a journal meant I was keen to do journalling today and decided to do it before bed. The journal asked for 3 things I was grateful for that day. After the pessimist in me initially thought ‘how will I think of 3 things’, it was actually a really nice way to reflect back on the day. There will always be things to be grateful for and to actively think of them was a great way to see the day in a positive light.

Tuesday:

Today I did some breathwork using the Healthy Minds app. I chose to do this as soon as I got up in the morning, whilst still in bed. I found this one a bit tricky as I was easily distracted thinking about what I needed to do for the day. I perhaps need to find a better time to do this one.

Wednesday:

Today I decided my daily holiday would be 30 minutes in the garden reading Dr Julie Smith’s book, Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before? This was a good opportunity for some self-reflection and perspective. I find the outdoors very relaxing but it being summer made this easy, in winter it might not be so easy to find a quiet spot to read. I really enjoyed this though.

Thursday:

By now I was really enjoying this chance to escape for a few minutes or so each day and reflect on myself and life. Today I did some journalling, but this time I just wrote and wrote, completely unstructured. It felt good to get everything out of my mind, a brain dump on the page.

Friday:

Today I went for a walk without my headphones, usually I like to walk listening to a podcast but I tried it without. At first it felt weirdly vulnerable but I soon found that actually I was paying more attention what was happening around me and things on my mind. It was a good chance to think. However, being one of those annoying people who like to be productive all the time I think I prefer to walk and listen. It might be something I do on the odd occasion though, if I feel I need perspective.

On the whole I really enjoyed this week of daily holidays and it is definitely something I will try and keep up. I found the brain dump journalling the most useful activity. It allowed me to just get everything out of my head and as I did I could make sense of what was rational or not.

Have you tried a daily holiday? What did you do and how did you find it?