Squash that urge to see it all; vacation means time to relax

Workers in the U.S. take an average of 13 vacation days a year, according to the World Tourism Organization and a recent Expedia survey. The result: Many travelers cram way too many activities into too little time.

“I think it’s worse when travelers go to another country,” says Linda Tillman, an Atlanta psychologist. “You [think you] can’t go back and see it later. You can always fly back to San Francisco.”

Travelers on three-day weekends may feel especially desperate to squeeze in as much sightseeing as possible, she says.

Overcommitted vacation planners tend to rate themselves by their accomplishments. Although a packed schedule can give them more for their vacation buck, more photographs and bragging rights, it can defeat the purpose of time off from work: satisfaction and relaxation.

“The more people treat vacation as work, the lower the satisfaction,” says John W. Lounsbury, professor of psychology at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, who has profiled vacation personalities.

Overcommitted travelers are most often hard-driving types whose workday style spills over into their vacation style, he says. “Someone who overcommits on vacation also tends to run, run, run in other areas.”

The further ahead you tend to plan trips, the more likely you may be to cram the agenda, says John G. Lynch Jr., a marketing professor at Duke University in Durham, N.C., who has done research on people who overcommit at work and home. Lynch thinks some of the same findings apply to travelers.

Although the urge to hit all possible highlights is understandable, there is “a point at which the overcommitment becomes a liability,” Lounsbury says.

Over-planning vacation time can increase stress, he notes. A study by one of Lounsbury’s students measured stress levels among these Type-A trip planners.

Pre-vacation planning caused their stress levels to rocket, Lounsbury says. And “the net effect of the vacation was to bring the stress back to pre-vacation levels,” not lower them.

Living under such constant stress can drive up blood pressure and suppress the immune system, among other ill effects, some studies show. So how can you slow down?

Step back.

Before you plan, think about the big picture and consider what you want to get out of the trip. “You’re certainly not going to be rested at the end of an overcommitted vacation,” Tillman says. “If there is no downtime, you have missed the point of the vacation.”

Get a little creative.

Fit in downtime without feeling you are missing out. When Tillman recently visited her adult daughter in Japan, they did a lot of sightseeing and relaxed on trains between destinations.

Adopt a different style.

Don’t account for -- or plan -- every minute as you do at work. Become more adaptable, spontaneous and open to whatever possibilities the experience might present.

Those who overcommit, says Lounsbury, “are not keeping a nice boundary between work and leisure.”

Be willing to compromise.

“It is important that you and whomever you are traveling with share a definition of what relaxation means,” Tillman says.

When a hard-charging traveler has a laid-back companion, they may have to hammer out a schedule of structured activities and relaxation time before departure.

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Healthy Traveler appears every other week. Kathleen Doheny can be reached at kathleendoheny@earthlink.net.