Better Vacations Part 3: Play Together and Rediscover Joy

Vacations are meant to be relaxing and fun, so why do they sometimes cause conflict? Or why do you sometimes come home feeling empty?

It takes intention to dream, plan, and play on your vacation. Here’s a three-part series to help you become better Friends, better Partners, and better Lovers with your next vacation.

Do you know how to have fun on vacation? Sounds like a dumb question, right? Isn’t fun the whole purpose of vacation? But many people struggle. Fight. And feel deep disappointment because they didn’t get the vacation of their dreams.

For the past two weeks, I’ve talked about the Friend and Partner roles in your relationship. Now let’s talk about the role of The Lover on your vacation. The Lover is the do-er. The one who actually goes on vacation. It’s a key element of having fun on vacation and most people just wait for that Lover energy to land in their lap.

But fun can be mysterious. You have to know how to have fun. And you need to actively lean into fun if you want to feel the fun.

 

Lovers are really good at one thing: being selfish

The Lover asks, What do I want? What makes me happy?

This is a good thing. When you allow yourself to want what you want, your pleasure shows. Your pleasure becomes contagious.

When I’m rafting down a river with my husband he is in his element. He’s happy because he’s outside. He’s happy because he’s rowing a boat. He’s happy because I’m with him. And his full-body bliss hangs in the air, flavoring every moment that I drink in.

It’s intimacy. Sharing joy.

I invite you to have a full-body-bliss moment with your sweetheart this summer and watch how your happiness lights up your relationship.

This concept is most easy to understand if we look at the opposite: that person who isn’t in their element and can’t find a way to let happiness in.

This person complains. Complain about the flight delays, complain about the accommodations, complain about the weather.

Do you remember my number one rule for your happily ever after? Stay in your own business.

Do you remember the three kinds of business that one of my teachers, Byron Katie articulated:

• Your business
• Your sweetheart’s business
• God’s business

You know you’re in your own business when you can feel your body and control your behavior.

You know you’re in your sweetheart’s business when you’re telling them what they should do, think, or feel.

You know you’re in God’s business when you’re trying to change things that are beyond anyone’s control like the weather or a flight delay.

You will be happiest to the extent that you can stay in your own business. Controlling your own behavior and emotions.

 

How to stay in your own business on vacation

Previously, I gave an example of the kiss. If you’re not in your own body, feeling your own feels, you miss the kiss. If you’re thinking, “Does my sweetheart like kissing me?” you’re not feeling your lips on your sweetheart’s lips. You can’t smell your sweetheart. You can’t feel the softness of their lips.

Oh my friends, there are so many people who come into my office and complain. And I help them see how they missed their own vacation because they forgot to stay in their own business.

If you stay in your own business you won’t miss the rollercoaster. You won’t miss the beauty of the river. You won’t miss the luscious afternoon nap.

It might sound selfish to stay in your own business, but it is the golden ticket to not only having a great vacation yourself but also to giving everyone else a great vacation.

You will make your best memories on vacation if you are bold about chasing your own desire rather than trying to make other people happy.

 

Your selfishness is a gift to your relationship. Especially on vacation.

Here’s how to give your selfishness as a gift to your sweetheart (and simultaneously create a fabulous vacation).

I want you. I want to build a sandcastle with you. I want to jump into the river with you. I want to nap while you go play golf for three hours. I want you to take your kids and have an amazing time riding rollercoasters while I sit at this park bench and scroll on my phone.

Can you see how voicing your desire—boldly, loudly—makes everything clear? No guesswork required. Fun announced.

I can hear some of you are reticent. You’re asking me, “But how will I know when to rein in my selfishness?” Here’s when: when your desire impedes your sweetheart’s ability to chase their desire.

Guess whose responsibility your sweetheart’s joy is? Your sweetheart! That’s right. If you’re staying in your own business, tending your own desires, you make it easier for your sweetheart to do the same.

I hear some of you whispering to me, “But my sweetheart doesn’t know how to have fun without me.” Guess what? That’s none of your business.

If this idea—that your sweetheart’s happiness is none of your business—is tough for you to swallow, you and I need to have a private session. Please reach out to me at 970-210-4480.

In the meantime, I want to ask you this, “How often have you tried and tried and tried to make your sweetheart happy and the result was that you failed, and failed and failed…oh! But there was that ONE time I made them happy…” This is not relationship. It’s co-dependence.

 

Expect your sweetheart to stay in their own business and expect your sweetheart to talk to you about their desires

When you EACH stay in your own business guess what happens?

• You both dive into the soft lips of the kiss!
• You both revel in the rush of the rollercoaster!
• You both enjoy the beauty and the peace of the river!

And when you’re both enjoying, and reveling, and soaking in the peace, you are creating intimacy, connection, and an incredible vacation that you’ll both remember for the rest of your lives.

When your desire impedes your sweetheart’s desire. Discuss this. Go two ways and meet back? Or is it your turn to dive into your sweetheart’s desire? If so, go all in. Show your joy, not your tolerance.

Here’s an example:

My father was exceptional at practicing happiness. He grew up hungry in the middle of The Great Depression and he learned young that happiness didn’t depend on your circumstances. Happiness is something you create.

I remember one backpacking trip when it was pouring rain. Pouring. I was hiking by myself and my internal dialogue went something like this: “I hate this. My feet are wet. My back hurts. This sucks.”

Then my dad came and hiked beside me. He started telling me jokes. Jokes about the drop of rain on the tip of my nose. Jokes about my soggy boots (“I could hear those boots squeaking 10 paces back!). And then we began to sing. “I’m singing in the rain! Just singing in the rain”

It is one of my most treasured memories. This is the power of vitality and love of life that the Lover possesses. The Lover knows how to have fun no matter the circumstances. And if you want a vacation to change your life, just plug into this superpower of The Lover.

Because if you learn to do this—to have fun no matter where you are?—you will be happy ever after.

When your desire impedes your sweetheart’s desire. Discuss this. Shall we each go our own way and meet back? Or is it your turn to dive into your sweetheart’s desire? If so, go all in. Show your joy, not your tolerance.

Supportive Lovers bask in their own desire so much that they seduce their sweetheart to join them. But they also adore seeing their sweetheart basking in their desire. And they dive in to join them.

3-part vacation series + bonus of The Friend role

We’ve talked about how The Friend Role will help you get to know about your sweetheart’s dreams and then dream bigger dreams together. We talked about how The Partner Role will help you plan all the details of an exceptional vacation. And we talked about how The Lover Role let’s you deepen the fun by each diving deep into your own desire.

I want to circle back to The Friend Role because the one more thing you need to have a great vacation is to remember it. And remember it again. This is a great way for you to deepen your Friendship with your sweetheart.

Remember. Remember. Remember.

When you can remember fondly all the times you’ve shared, that allows you to suck the juice out of your vacation over and over. And, like any good fish story, the memories can get bigger with each telling. It’s a way to make sure your sweetheart feels seen, and valued, and loved. Treasured. So that final step in a great vacation is remembering.

Remembering is a skill you can learn to do more and more.