Contrary to popular belief, traveling around the world is not as expensive as you might imagine. People from all walks of life can travel to different countries and even live abroad for years at a time. However, Americans still put traveling up on a pedestal of this unattainable feat that you can only have once you are rich.
Studies have shown that traveling actually makes people happier than having a lot of money. Here are some reasons why you just might be happier and more successful if you decide to travel instead of just focusing on making money.
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20. Travel Increases Productivity
In the United States, there’s a negative stigma on taking a vacation. Some people even take pride in not having had a break for several years. Others are afraid to travel because it can be difficult to get time off your job. In many workplaces, you might get time off, but there’s pressure keeping you there. Your employer or co-workers might make you feel awful about taking a break because it’s perceived as lazy.
What Americans don’t realize is that this is a cultural phenomenon. To the rest of the world, this lifestyle is not normal and is actually incredibly unhealthy. In the United Kingdom, every single person who works a part-time or full-time job has “holiday entitlement” of 5.6 weeks of paid time off. That’s right, for the British, the right to take a vacation is literally law.
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Studies have shown that contrary to what you might believe, taking a vacation and traveling actually increases your productivity. Leading up to a vacation, most people make sure that they are getting everything done on their to-do list. They are accomplishing more on a daily basis both in their personal and professional lives to ensure that they can take a trip without anything in the back of their mind.
And when they come back from their vacation, they’re eager to be as productive as possible. When you take a break, you can take time off to be a human being and enjoy the company of your friends and family. In turn, this makes you a better employee.