I have lost count of the number of times I have been asked “How do you manage to travel so much with a full time job?” or “Share tips on travelling with full time job” and all such.
To all these I smile and say, to make travel to happen all you need is enthusiasm and the true urge from inside and of course a few tricks to be a master in managing work and passion
Make the most of all leaves you have:
We are gifted with 52 weekends, 12 public holidays, 24 ELs and 12 CLs That makes 152 days. Almost 50% of the year. God has almost balanced it and its for us to learn the tricks of the trade. Do your permutations and combinations right. Few quick examples:
- Do a good study of the holiday list at the beginning of the year. Save your CLs for a Monday or Friday when the Tuesdays or Thursdays are holiday respectively. Straight 4 days you see!
- Mark all long weekends, keep them for short trips, travel a Thursday Night, reach your destination by Friday morning, you have 3 full days to explore a place, start for your home Sunday night and back to office on Monday
- If the holiday falls on Wednesday, do not be disappointed, use up two CLs, prefix or Sufix it and you have straight 5 days
- So out of 12 public Holidays, on an average you will have 50% of it on Long weekends and rest 50% can be longer weekends with the blessings of Casual Leaves! Plan it right
- And then after all these, you have only 2 days weekend, when you can just get on a bus, or a car and go anywhere you wish to and be back in a day. I energize myself with such mini trips when nothing else works
Learning the art of permutation combination is the key
Drag yourself to work on days you don’t feel like:
I have had Mondays when all I want is wrap myself up in my favourite blanket drop a sick leave message and go off to sleep! But then I know if I do it once I will be tempted to do it many more times, and it will become a vicious cycle and I will end up using my leaves sitting at home doing nothing. That’s enough a nightmare to force myself to get up and get going.
To make most of my vacation, I am usually back home either Sunday late night or Monday early morning, making it even more difficult to make it to office! But I make it a point to make it to work no matter what since I believe the more I crib about going to work after a vacation, the more I make life difficult to myself and since my work makes my travel dream come true, I should love it as much.
Trust me it’s all in the mind, so next time you are back from a vacation, do not take a leave to rest, rather save it for the next vacation. And at the end it is these little efforts that will add on and will get you leaves when you need it most. This is tried and tested formula! It works
Feel Fit, stay fit and turn sick leaves to vacation leaves:
That has been like motto forever. In my seven years of corporate career, I have taken not even 10 cumulative sick leaves in total. I am not bragging, but this is something I am proud of. Yes, I have been blessed with a good health but I am a human and I do have viral fevers, severe headaches or my monthly menstrual cycles, when all I crave for is a good rest. But I get up tell myself, if at 25 or 30 I am lying on bed for these silly reasons, God save my life post 50s. And I simply ignore my headaches, tummy aches, back aches whatever little things that are termed as being sick, wear a wide smile on my face, dress up in my best outfit, boost myself up and leave for work!
The next time you are sick, try not to feel sick and it will work wonders.
Love your job it will love you right back:
I work hard because I have to travel harder. Yes I don’t mind, staying late at work if my work demands, don’t crib if once in a while I have to work on weekends, unless real emergencies I do not take unplanned leaves on principle and little gestures like these always adds up and in turn all organisations I have worked with have loved me back and given me leaves when I wanted. My motto has always been, give your 100% to your job and by the law of attraction, you will get back all the love. There might be contradictions to this, but me being a true believer of Law of Attraction I have seen magic happening . No harm giving it a shot!
Plan Early, Apply Leaves early and keep your colleagues informed
The best way to get your leaves smoothly approved is plan in advance. Give your team mates, your boss, heads up at least 3 months before if you are planning a long vacation, keep your one team mate prepped up to take care of deliverables in your absence.
For shorter days of leaves too at least plan two weeks in advance. Nothing better than going on a pre planned leaves with a peace of mind.
Image Credit: vulcanpost.com
Volunteer and take up work assignments that lets you travel
So what’s really ‘looking-up-to’ worthy in a corporate job; I’ve always tried to find an answer to that. Probably the remuneration, the ranks, the respect, there surely are so many such things.
But what makes it even more worthy for travel worms like me, are the perks of travel; travel to places all over the world which have had their places on our bucket list since ever. And for that, I can never thank my job more.
Take up assignments and projects that lets you do so. Extend your work travel by a day or two and explore. Travelling is sometimes all about stealing moments and making memories, no matter how work loaded trip it might look.
Image Credit: minimalworld.com
If you are passionate about traveling, stay true to your heart, and everything else will fall into place!
So Whats your trick to travel with a full time job?
One Earth Too Less 
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