#12 - Great Vacation Expectations

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

vacation, thoughts, expectations, drinks, peter, trip, young man, flight, teenager, trisha, purpose, strangers, life, sit, realistic expectations, friends, head, bros, training, travel

SPEAKERS

Trisha Barita

00:02

Hey there, I'm Trisha Barita. I'm a mother of twin girls, a wife, an entrepreneur, a psychology major, a lawyer, and a coach. With all these different roles in my life, in the past, I truly struggled with limiting beliefs in my ability to adequately juggle all these roles successfully, I often would be frustrated that time and again, I let my goals and dreams always take a backseat to everything else I was trying to do. And those dreams always seem to be on the horizon, just out of reach. Until I discovered tools and thought work to help me tackle and learn to balance all of it. Now, I don't let these titles define my limits. I define my balance in life, by how I choose to show up for myself every day. Am I perfect? Hell no far from it. But I do work every day to believe in myself, and to be present with whatever I experienced in this life, The Good, the Bad, and The really fucking ugly. to own my truth and own my thoughts. I created this podcast to talk about how that noise gets in the way of our goals as women. And now I help women and teach them tools to cut the overwhelm of noise in their life, preventing them from getting the balance they want. If you like this podcast and want to take my free course to get started on designing your balance, and saying fuck that noise, go to Trisha barita.com forward slash free course. Now let's get after it.

02:07

Hello, fabulous friends. So I love vacations, especially the idea of them. I love travel vacations. I love staycations. I'm one of those geeky nerdy planners. So I'm like, always reading all the reviews on the hotels, looking at the menus of local restaurants. You know, trying to find the unique things to do. You know, it could be an adventure vacation, or exploring a city beach activities, especially snorkeling, experiencing maybe something I've never done our Nether never seen. It's almost always on my list, even if I'm visiting the same place over and over again. But yeah, I'm down for all of it. What kind of vacation Do you enjoy? Are you like a beach person? Or maybe like the city explorer? Or cruise? I got a few friends that are really into those cruises. Road trip. Camping, or glamping. Or maybe you're just like, that's a no. Just the hotel for me, Georgia. Like I want to tell you about a recent trip over the past year that I took with Peter and the twins. So so my family my little family had not really traveled in a while. We'd done a short road trip here or there but like no big plane flights. And while I had gotten antsy I think Peter had gotten antsy too, but I definitely gotten the antsy to get back out there to travel a little more. We love traveling so we decided to take our first big trip with the girls in a while right on an airplane to have a good family vacation.

04:05

And I'm not gonna lie, I was excited. I splurged on some vacation outfits and new flip flops we were headed to a beachy place. And I was really looking forward to getting out of Texas for a hot minute. So we had not traveled on a plane with a twin since the girls were four. And this was going to be a long flight with a connecting flight. And I was worried about how the girls were going to do at six years old. It's quite a bit different than four years old. In the past, we usually sat with one kid by a window and parent in the middle with a stranger would always sit on the other side of the parent and usually me sitting in front of Peter and whichever twin so I would have a twin next to the window next to me and Peter would be in the row behind us with the whoever the other twin was that wasn't with me. But I think I had just over thought this flight because we've not traveled in a while. Because I convinced Peter it made more sense to put the them in the middle and the IOC, the girls next to each other. And then like one parent sits on the aisle seat with the other pan on parent on the other aisle seats. So we're kind of all in a row together, then the girls weren't sitting next to any strangers. And then maybe Peter and I could actually talk on the long flight because usually we wouldn't, we wouldn't be sitting next to each other, like I just explained. So. So since Peter is much taller than me, I told him that he should sit next to the girls. And if you wanted to, we could switch later, which meant I would be sitting in the in the, you know, across the aisle, and, you know, next to him, but next to two other strangers next to me. So now we've set all that up for you explain what happened. So it all seemed fine. All right, we're flying Southwest Airlines. So

05:57

you know, this seats are not assigned. And this young man, late teens, so teenager, okay, asked to sit by the window in my in my row. And I'm like, sure, you know, and he says, My friend is coming to sit here, can he have the middle seat, and I'm like, sure, you know, whatever. And so these these young guys, these two young guys both sit in the window and metal seat next to me. And I'm pulling out my planner to jot some notes down and listen to some podcast on my phone. Well, the beverage service starts partway through the flight and the young man in the middle seat next to me orders a coke and a water two drinks, okay. And he's like, totally not paying attention when the flight attendant comes back around with all the drinks. So you know, she keeps trying to give him the drinks and he's like glued to the fire him and all the him and the young man next to him, they're glued to their phone playing this like video game where I think they're all like kind of playing together. And I ended up having to tap this young man on the shoulder to point out that the flight attendant was trying to get his attention. And so he and his friend, like have nothing out on their flip down tables except their phones. And they're playing this group video game. And, and the kid again, young man next to me had like plenty of room, right, because something on the table itself is a little cell phone for his two drinks, his coke and his water. So I don't even know how he did this. But he maybe had like, have the drinks for like five minutes and barely drink any of it. And all of a sudden he spilled both of them all over me. And my flip down table in the in the and also in the gap below the table somehow, all over my jeans. Below that all over my backpack, which on the floor, which had my laptop in it all over my phone and my headphones that were on the table. I really it kind of baffles me on how he did that. You know, he didn't spill any of it on himself. So it just kind of like went all over me. And so and it turns out we were surrounded I realized by all of these guys, it was an if I was gonna stereotype them. I would probably call them a group of bros. Although I think maybe they were more like bros in training because they were so young like these, this teenager age and their backpacks all said rugby, and kind of after looking around before all this happened with the drinks or later I realized that they had two adult guys that appeared to be like in charge of supervising them. And I don't know if they were coaches or what but anyway, I'm not gonna lie when he when he spilt the two drinks all over me my jeans, my backpack computer and somehow none of it on himself.

08:49

At the beginning of what I was planning to be, of course, you know, the most perfect vacation in my head. And two long flights. My brain was like, WTF dude. So many thoughts. So I get up and turn to Peter, and give him all my like what electronics? Actually, I'm not sure where the young man the broken training went. He seemed to have gone to the front of the plane bathroom and was trying to figure all what had happened out. I went to the back of the plane because that's where I saw the flight attendants were and I was like, Can I have some paper towels the guy next to me, filter strings all over me and the flight attendant who had served me and him said Oh no. Then she said wait a minute. Is this the guy who couldn't be bothered when I tried to bring him his drinks? And I was like yep, that's the guy. So went back and clean everything up and the young man was trying to clean up those seeds. You know, could the seed had gotten wet? Of course so and Peter help me clean up the laptop which we hoped would be okay. I I'm, and I sat down and my mind had settled somewhat, but there was some rumbling of thoughts about how now I have to fly the rest of this flight. And the next flight with pants stained with coke. And that maybe my laptop was messed up. And why did I choose for us to sit like this and just all kinds of just stuff running through my head. But as I sat there on the plane, and the young man, my the bro in training, returned to his video game playing on his phone, you know, along with all the other Bros and training around as apparently, I just sat there, and I listen to my thoughts and let them come in and let them be there for a minute or more. And I just sort of started to process them.

10:48

Like I, I really wasn't upset about the young kid doing what, you know, what teens do what teenagers do, you know, be a bit absent minded, and, you know, being distracted with tech. He's just a kid, right? So why the hell was I so upset? You know, I think it's easy to create an expectation of something like a vacation, of how it's going to be how everyone is going to be hate around you, the people you came with, or the strangers that you're around, in my case Bros and training, I jokingly refer to them as right. And then something happens, you know, on this vacation, not on the plan, not what you wanted. And it's not, you know, ideal, like in this particular instance, I mean, please raise your hand if you think of a single soul that wants to get on the first of two long airplane flights and have a teenager dumba coke all over their lap. You know, who raised their hand friends? Like? The answer's no, buddy. So when the unexpected happens. And granted, I know this is not a huge drama deal. But I'm bringing this up for the point of the thoughts that came up in my head. When this stuff happens, when unexpected happens, and the noise in your head lights up with all kinds of BS thoughts, you've got two choices, really, you can indulge in that thinking to the point that it poisons not just the plane flight, not just your mood, but everyone around you for some of your trip, or possibly all of your trip. Or you can neutralize these Bs thoughts and start to realize that you know, a circumstance of what happens on vacation is just shit happening. And I can choose how to feel about in any way that I want. And I don't have to let it make me feel like anything is ruined. In the past, I may have like, indulgent is, in these Bs thoughts longer than I would want for myself. But this trip, well, definitely some BS thoughts came up about my expectations of this vacation.

12:57

Remember, I have been planning this for weeks, I bought all these outfits I had all these ideas about this was going to be the most amazing, and how. And, you know, I could have all these, you know, indulge in these Bs thoughts longer about how it didn't go as planned, especially in the first one hours of the trip. You know that what I was able to do by letting myself sort of recognize that those thoughts were there that they came up but that they aren't controlling situation, they you know, the circumstances and causing those thoughts, I'm having these thoughts and that it's just a part of, you know, my brain sort of processing what happened. And then I can just recognize that those thoughts aren't necessary, and they don't serve me on how I want to show up for my vacation and how I want to show up for everyone that I love that I'm on vacation with. So by the eighth, being able to let all that go, you know, just after a short time, I ended up not thinking about the bros and training till I got back home. And you know, was reflecting on my trip. And I thought about the topic of this podcast. By the way, though, my laptop was fine, and my pants were not fully steamed. But even if they even if they were, you know, hey, life is not perfect, and neither are vacations. And remembering that in it can be useful in managing your expectations, especially vacation expectations. I'm telling the story because I think it's pretty easy to have all kinds of expectations for when you go on vacation. So, in Webster's dictionary, the definition of vacation includes two definitions I thought would be useful for this discussion of vacations. The number one definition that I thought I would talk about was it says a Webster's Dictionary says it's a period of time spent away from home or business in travel or recreation. The number two definition is that it's a time of respite, or rest or relief from something? Well, which is it for you? And you may feel it's both. But really think about it. Are you spending a period of time away from home or business? Or are you seeking rest or relief from something? See, I

15:23

think those are two very different thoughts about how to approach vacation. One sounds more like a period of rest, and the other sounds like seeking an escape for me. That's what it sounds like. And when I'm talking about escape, I mean, the idea and thought that a vacation is to escape you from regular life, escape you from reality, escape you from responsibility escape you from whatever. If that's true, then what are your expectations for your vacation? Well, dang, if you're trying to escape, your thoughts are probably this vacation, it needs to be epic, to escape you from whatever. Let me put it another way, one of the popular definitions of vacation is under the Urban Dictionary. And I love this one. It's it's that it's a period of time in which an adult pretends that they are a child again, and has no responsibilities to attend to spends money, like the world is ending, and relaxes. And the definition ended with vacation is usually followed by a period of financial instability, hundreds of emails, and depression from the lack of vacation. It's like, well, Dang, this kind of kills the mood. I mean, who wants to go on vacation after that? Don't worry. It's not all doom and gloom. I believe that a lot about enjoying vacation and getting some rest and being present in the moment with yourself and your loved ones, is the thought work around expectations of that vacation, hence the name of this podcast. I know, it's all about that tricky mind. Look, let's not make this complicated. Remember, the mind is a beautiful thing, but also a tricky thing. expectations can sneak up on you, even when you don't realize it. Let me give you some examples. If you're going on vacation, you may have thoughts that you're going to accomplish personal goals that you normally do not have time for, like you plan to work out every day of vacation, or you plan to you know, eat on this particular diet and lose five pounds. I mean, think all kinds of things are personal goals of you know, of trying to learn some type of new skill. Like if you're, you're like, I'm gonna be the most amazing, you know, scuba diver on this vacation, or I'm gonna, you know, do whatever, hike this many miles or climb this, you know, whatever mountain or something. It can be physical, or it could be, you know, mental things that you want to accomplish. But you could also have expectations that you have thoughts that your spouse or significant others or friends or even strangers that you encounter are going to treat you a certain way, or that they are going to show up in a certain way, because it's vacation, or thoughts that your kids are going to behave like angels the entire time, because you're on vacation, you may have thoughts that the epic experience that you booked restaurant, boat ride excursion, whatever is going to change your life or that it's at least just going to go off without a hitch. And you may have thoughts that you will feel rested and amazing at the end of the vacation. And that if you don't, then you really didn't have a good vacation. And there's tons of thoughts you could have. Maybe you have all of these or maybe if none of them. Either way, you can actually take a step back and do something for yourself. You can visualize the vacation before you go. I like to think about what is really the purpose of the vacation. And I like to actually name and identify three things that is my purpose and my might not be everybody else's purpose that's going on the vacation but three things that are important to me. And it doesn't ruin a vacation I have a purpose. So don't get caught up like Well, that's not very off the cuff, you know, Trisha or that's not very, you know, fly by the seat of your pants kind of thing. Look, it can be more than that for you because it really isn't about ruining the vacation. It can feel good to have some things to focus on. Sometimes I pick physical things that I want to do like visit this place or do this thing. Or sometimes I just write that I want to spend quality time with my husband or quality time with my children and my husband were impressed With less screen time, or you know, less distractions, or maybe I want to try local cuisine, or I have a day with no plan, maybe that's one of my purposes to see where the day takes us. The reason I say this is that when you really think about what matters to you, and that, that's what I mean, when I say you write it down, you don't have like, all these floating expectations out there where you know,

20:26

you want all these things to happen in this short period of time that is called vacation, you can kind of focus your energy on like, what really is something that you want to have happen. And you can, you can do a couple of things with that information, you can express that to your significant other, which I have to tell you can be very helpful. When your significant other has different expectations of the vacation, I'll get into that some other day, but you can express it to your children about what's important to you, or whoever you're going on the trip with. You know, it's really important to me that we, you know, do XYZ or I would really like this, and maybe they don't want to do that, or they have different expectations, and you can kind of talk that out. So you're not in like some heat of the moment, like anyone's upset about how people didn't show up the way you wanted them to. And you kind of take that personally, it may not be maybe just be that they have different purposes of what they wanted to do on this vacation. And that's okay. But it is helpful to kind of, I think, think some of that stuff through I mean, we're all human beings, we're not all identical. So it can be easy to have differential defining, you know, different expectations than other people. And it can be helpful to tell the people that you care about that are on your trip, kind of what's important to you, so that if they want to, like help accomplish that, hopefully, if it's your significant other children that they will, but you know that, that it can be something that they recognize, you know, and that and it can be something that you know, you openly identify, but I mean other things that you can do with this information about what maybe are your like, three purposes, is that, you know, you can visualize like how you're going to accomplish these things, and not just sort of expect them to happen. So if you want to have a time, you know, where everybody sort of present together, say it's a family vacation, and there's more than just even your children or significant other. Or to be group of friends vacation. I mean, you play on like a whole meal and tell everybody this is important, and really want everyone to show up, we're gonna do a group picture or something like that. So that everyone kind of understands, like, this is kind of the thing. That's an important thing for you. Anyway, so that's just kind of one thing that I mean, also, just say one of the things is your personal goal, like you really, really want to, you know, plan to eat a certain way. So you can look at the restaurants and sort of identify, hey, these restaurants are really going to be good. So sort of geared towards trying to eat at some of those restaurants, or you could try to if you're gonna work out look at like, Hey, if you're gonna be especially if it's a traveling kind of trip, where how am I going to do it am I going to bring certain things with me to be able to work out or I'm going to download a couple apps that I could use on the road or, or in the hotel room? Or do they have a gym in this particular hotel, like kind of planning out like how you see it play out and then you know, again, working around like everyone else that you may be on the trip with so that you can get in whatever it is that you want to accomplish for yourself. So I think those are kind of really great things that you can sort of visualize and think through prior to going on to your vacation. And also I also think when you focus yourself on like three things, maybe you can start to realize that you may have other things you want to maybe do but that you don't have the most realistic expectations about them. Like I was I was joked that I used to pack like my husband I before we had kids, I'd go on a trip with them and I would pack like four or five books into the suitcase which would make the suitcase heavier which I think probably frustrated Peter

24:27

and and but but I really wouldn't really these books I really would have opened like one book for a little bit but like it's because like I was going to spend time with him. And for me, one of my purposes was spend time with him and I would realize this on vacation and not read the books. But and I would continue to do it I don't know because it just like in my head. I was like oh, I want you know I want to do that. But it just didn't really match with the realistic expectations of what really was the purpose of for me, and there's nothing wrong with going reading a bunch of books on vacation. No, certainly not. But like for me on those particular time. cuz it was when we were taking time off from work together to spend time together. And so in retrospect, it seems kind of silly, but it's just an example of not having like thought through the realistic expectations I had there, I mean, you may have some expectations that you have found that are unreasonable, such as health goals, you know, some idea that you're going to eat a certain way, or exercise a certain way. But for you, maybe it's not really realistic to the type of trip you're going on. So although you may be have wanted to plan that you were going to go work out every morning, it could be that you want to workout twice, while on vacation, like actually, you know, do weights or whatever, and spend the other time doing hiking or exploring the city on a bike, you know, getting your exercise in some other way. Or, you know, if you're trying to figure out how to, you know, eat a certain way, again, like I said, you may decide, hey, I don't, I don't wanna have to get like that every day on vacation, I may just go, this is what I'm trying to do to make healthier choices or to drink enough water every day or do what these particular things for my health on vacation, but I'm not going to be like strict rigid diet or something. And those kinds of things. The reason I say that is because I feel like as women, we we do get up in our head about some of these ideas, and they can easily translate to you know, being hard on ourselves like that we should show up in a certain way on vacation. And then when we don't we come back and we're disappointed and I think there's just no reason to go through that process. It's just ideal. What is really your purpose for the vacation? I say I always like to pick around three. Because then if things go awry, you know, Umbro, in training spills coke all over? Not really hugely. All right, right. Like, look, I mean, it's not like the end of the world. I mean, there are bad things that can happen on vacation. And I hope none of them happened to you. But when little things at least go wrong, you can start to go back to what was the three purposes of this vacation for me and invest your energy and getting your focus and your thoughts back to that processing, whatever happened that wasn't ideal or wasn't great. And then let it go. So you can truly enjoy the time you've set aside for yourself. I'll tell you going back to, to that vacation that I was telling you about the header at the beginning of this podcast. At the end of the flight on my vacation, one of the young guys in the row right next to us that was talking to the young kids, the young guys next to me, he like, like, picked up his phone and used his phone to turn the camera on himself. So he could like he liked this lock. He was like queefing are fixing his leg baggy long locks. And anyway, I love teenagers. I just thought Yep. and laughed myself. You know? He's definitely a bro and training for sure. But don't you worry, don't you worry about those bros. I love a bro I got nothing against bros or Bros and training or whatever. Hey, they have their own path and, and wherever, wherever they ended up on that vacation. I hope they had a good vacation doing whatever Burroughs or BROZEN training do. For myself. That vacation turned out pretty awesome. I soaked up every minute of beachy fun with the girls and Peter that we could have before he had to come home. So we hope you take a minute or more before you go on your next vacation and reflect on what is the purpose of this trip for you. I say visualize it. I mean maybe even journal it or just jot down some notes. Be realistic. Try not to be unrealistic and these expectations. communicate what you think may be helpful in you know, making it a good trip for everyone that's going on the trip with you. And don't let BS thoughts take you away from truly enjoying that special time for yourself and for your loved ones who you're traveling with. And I'll leave you with that. Now go get after it. You got this

29:21

Hey, thanks for listening today. If you enjoyed this episode, and are a woman ready to say fuck that noise, so you can start designing the balance in your life. Go take my free course to get started at Trisha barita.com forward slash free course. Now Have an awesome day and I'll see you next week.