Like many people, I spend much of my time at home fantasising about my next holiday. During the trip itself, most of my stresses seem to melt away, and I return feeling optimistic and energised.
Each time, I am determined to integrate those feelings into my day-to-day life, but I am almost invariably disappointed. Within a couple of weeks – sometimes less, depending on how much time I have to spend on the London Underground – I become the same irritable and frustrated person that I always was. And so, I start dreaming about my next escape.
As I planned a recent trip to Madrid, I wondered whether I was foolish to hope that my travels would offer anything more than temporary relief.
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Delving into the psychological literature, though, I was relieved to see that the answer is a resounding no. Growing evidence explains the specific ways that our holidays can increase our wellbeing and, crucially, the types of activities that will offer the greatest restoration, based on the ancient Greek principle of eudaimonia: “human flourishing”.
“Instead of thinking only about where you are going to travel, you can think about what psychological experience you want the vacation to provide, and try to create that experience,” says Nanxi Yan, a psychologist at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands.
A serious consideration of holiday psychology has been a long time coming: until recently, psychologists studying wellbeing had mostly focused on the benefits of relaxation and leisure activities more generally. There have been plenty of studies on reading, for instance, while the research on vacations was patchy. As a result, they failed to capture the distinct opportunities for a mental reset that holidays can afford away from the daily grind. “From a psychological perspective, that separation is quite important,” says Yan.
Consider a recent review of the literature, published last year. Analysing the results of 32 different studies, Ryan Grant at the University of Georgia has shown that the average mood boost begins before we have even left home, as the anticipation of a trip builds. Those good feelings remain highly elevated for at least 21 days after we have returned home and may not return to the baseline for a further three weeks.
If you, like me, struggle to feel those longer-lasting benefits, it may be because you have been focusing on the “wrong” kind of happiness. Behavioural scientist Graeme McLean at the University of St Andrews Business School in the UK argues that we should distinguish between hedonic wellbeing, which concerns enjoyment and pleasure, and eudaimonic wellbeing, which concerns “personal growth, sense of purpose and meaning”.
“On holiday, hedonic wellbeing might come from lounging on a beach, enjoying nice food or staying in a lovely hotel,” he says. “Eudaimonic wellbeing might come from the sense of achievement in completing a challenging hike, learning about a new culture or forming connections with fellow travellers.”
Studying 462 holiday-makers, McLean and his colleague Mohammed Aldossary at King Faisal University in Saudi Arabia found that the boost in hedonic wellbeing faded pretty quickly, whereas the eudaimonic feelings lingered for at least eight weeks. For this reason, he recommends planning holidays that combine both elements – pure relaxation alongside the kinds of activities that feel more purposeful.
Yan agrees. “Travel can also expose people to novelty, different cultures, new activities and different versions of themselves,” she says – and it is here that the biggest benefits lie. “These experiences may help people not only feel rested, but also feel more alive, connected and reflective.”
So, what can we do to achieve it? Based on the available research on both hedonic and eudaimonic wellbeing, Yan and her colleagues distilled the key elements to think about (see below).
The elements of the perfect break
- Relatedness: Embrace social connection with your loved ones, local communities or nature
- Autonomy: Do something for your own desires, rather than others’
- Mastery: Overcome a fear or discover new skills
- Novelty: Seek new experiences
- Positive self: Learn about your core values and capabilities
- Emotion change: Look for positive feelings like comfort, pleasure or awe
- Escapism: Detach from your daily routine
- Meaning: Emphasise that one’s existence is significant, purposeful and coherent
You don’t have to include every single element, but you may benefit from reflecting on the list and deciding which are most significant to you. “For example, if relatedness is very important, you might want to prioritise meaningful time with family, friends or a partner, rather than trying to do too many activities,” says Yan. To maximise autonomy, “it helps to build in freedom and flexibility”, she says. “A vacation that is too tightly scheduled can become another source of pressure.”
Mastery, meanwhile, might involve attending an art class or learning to scuba dive, and the need for novelty might encourage you to try to experience a whole new culture, rather than returning to a familiar destination.
That may take more serious attention than you currently pay to your travel plans. “Do not treat vacations only as time off. Think about what kind of psychological needs the vacation can satisfy,” says Yan. The hard work may pay off immediately. “Our research showed that merely anticipating an upcoming vacation can boost wellbeing, so the planning and looking-forward phase has value in itself,” says McLean. “It’s better to book early!”
If you are worried about protecting your purse strings, rest assured that you can glean many of these benefits from shorter trips – in fact, the greatest relief may come from just five or six days away. Nor do the activities have to be exceptionally luxurious: in Grant’s meta-analysis, physical exercise proved to be one of the best predictors of enhanced wellbeing, and that can be achieved through long walks or visits to outdoor gyms.
You may not even have to leave your home city, provided that you take those psychological needs seriously enough and don’t simply spend the time catching up on other responsibilities. When planned correctly, taking some time off at home can still be beneficial, says Yan. “For example, people can create boundaries around work, avoid routine chores during the holiday period, try new local activities, spend quality time with others, visit nearby nature or create small rituals that make the time feel different from ordinary life.”
Whether you are travelling abroad or staying at home, you should try to find ways to immerse yourself in the memories of the experiences after your break has ended. Along these lines, McLean also found that using virtual-reality headsets to return to the location of their holidays significantly prolonged the wellbeing benefits experienced by his study participants.
We can’t all afford this technology, of course, but he suggests some lo-fi alternatives. “Deeply engaging with holiday memories – perhaps through journaling about the experience in vivid detail, creating a rich photo or video montage that you actively revisit, or even planning a return trip to the same destination – might tap into similar psychological pathways, though this would need further research to be confirmed.”
“The underlying factor is about re-engaging psychologically with the vacation experience in a rich, immersive way,” says McLean. You are unlikely to get this from passively scrolling through your photos; it needs your full attention.
Attempting to put all this into practice on my trip to Madrid, I made a greater effort to chat to locals in Spanish, maximising my sense of autonomy and mastery; attended a concert by one of my favourite singers, an experience that was imbued with meaning; and visited the city’s botanical gardens, which helped me connect to nature.
It has now been six weeks since I returned, and the warm glow remains. My sunnier mood may be slowly fading, but it hasn’t yet been extinguished. Now, I’m dreaming of my next trip.
