--- title: Vacation Days Can Improve Work-Life Balance description: Vacation is important, and it’s just as important to manage your life in a way that enables you to recharge on a regular basis. canonical: https://time.com/4927174/vacation-days-work-life-balance/ author: Roger Ferguson article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-09-05T18:44:34.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T17:17:01.065Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Why You Should Take Advantage of Your Vacation Days og:description: It's vital for workplace productivity og:url: https://time.com/4927174/vacation-days-work-life-balance/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Why You Should Take Advantage of Your Vacation Days twitter:description: It's vital for workplace productivity twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Why You Should Take Advantage of Your Vacation Days > Sponsored content. 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It explains how TIME's journalism is made, from the first pitch through the editorial decisions behind a finished story or cover. #### How can I read about how TIME chooses its covers? Inside TIME is the newsletter where TIME's Editor-in-Chief explains cover selection and the editorial reasoning behind major stories. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who is the editor of TIME? Sam Jacobs is TIME's Editor-in-Chief. He writes Inside TIME, a twice-weekly newsletter about the newsroom's reporting and editorial decisions. #### Is Inside TIME free? Yes. Inside TIME is a free newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-inside-2026q3/newsletters?i=9a6d21ef-d5bd-4b07-9a1b-2f70bda7dd63&cr=time-nl-inside-2026q3-v1) by [Roger Ferguson](https://time.com/author/roger-w-ferguson-jr/) ## Roger Ferguson Roger W. Ferguson Jr. is the Steven A Tananbaum Distinguished Fellow for International Economics at the Council on Foreign Relations. Sep 5, 2017 6:44 PM UTC by [Roger Ferguson](https://time.com/author/roger-w-ferguson-jr/) ## Roger Ferguson Roger W. Ferguson Jr. is the Steven A Tananbaum Distinguished Fellow for International Economics at the Council on Foreign Relations. Sep 5, 2017 6:44 PM UTC With summer over and the busy fall season upon us, it’s a perfect time for a reminder about something we all too often forget: being your best at work requires regularly taking time _away_ from work. This is not a novel concept — but Americans still seem to have trouble embracing it. Consider the issue of vacation. Although the [trend seems to be reversing somewhat](https://www.projecttimeoff.com/state-american-vacation-2017), last year, about half of workers failed to take all of their vacation days. American workers think “the path to career success requires sacrificing vacation,” according to Project: Time Off, an initiative that aims to get people to understand that taking time off is good for “individual well-being and professional success, business performance, and the broader economy.” Vacation is important, and it’s just as important to manage your life in a way that enables you to recharge on a regular basis. You simply must take time during the week for the pursuits that nourish you physically, intellectually, emotionally, spiritually and socially. For me, that means doing things like exercising, reading, seeking out interesting conversations, and spending time with family and friends. In the modern world, achieving “work-life balance” is a lot harder than it used to be. Today, technology makes it possible to be in touch with our work and colleagues on a nearly continuous basis. “Work” and “life” are a continuum, flowing into and influencing one another — sometimes with positive results, other times not. It’s up to us to carefully manage the interplay. If we do that in a way that bolsters our well-being, we’ll benefit both at home and in the office. The things I do in my time away from work are things that make me happy and more fulfilled as a human being. They also enhance my productivity and the quality of the work I do. It turns out that happiness and success go hand in hand. But [studies show](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16351326) that it’s not that success makes us happy; it’s that happiness breeds success in many aspects of life. The moral of the story is that if you want to excel at work, make sure that you’re not spending all your time there. And if you haven’t yet used all your vacation for 2017, now would be a great time to plan for how you’re going to do that before the end of the year. With that in mind, what things do you already do — or plan to do — to relax and recharge? _Follow Roger Ferguson on LinkedIn_ [_here_](https://www.linkedin.com/in/roger-w-ferguson-jr-69bb73a2)_._ _This_ [_article_](https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/better-work-take-time-away-roger-w-ferguson-jr-?published=t) _originally appeared on_ [_LinkedIn_](http://www.linkedin.com)_._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4927174/vacation-days-work-life-balance/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4927174/vacation-days-work-life-balance/"},"headline":"Why You Should Take Advantage of Your Vacation Days","datePublished":"2017-09-05T18:44:34.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T17:17:01.065Z","description":"It's vital for workplace productivity","url":"https://time.com/4927174/vacation-days-work-life-balance/","keywords":["Careers & Workplace"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Roger Ferguson","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/roger-w-ferguson-jr/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/careers-workplace/","name":"Careers & Workplace"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4927174/vacation-days-work-life-balance/","name":"Why You Should Take Advantage of Your Vacation Days"}}]}] ```