I had a coaching client once that was NOT a good vacation taker.
His family didn't like this, obviously. And he didn't like it, either. But he just didn't know how to shut off. He brought his work phone. He constantly checked email. And even though he did all those things on the trip, he was also super stressed out before the trip even happened—trying to make sure all of his "i's" were dotted and "t's" were crossed.
As you can imagine, a vacation wasn't much of a vacation. He spent the week being connected into his work, and disconnected from his family.
However, he wanted to change. So, we were talking a few weeks before a planned vacation and I said, "Name something on your desk."
"My orange highlighter," he said.
I asked. "What is its purpose?"
"It's how I call out important details," he said. "It helps me not miss anything."
"Okay," I said. "Now, how does that highlighter relate to your desire to take a work-free vacation?"
He thought for a moment. "I feel like work-free vacations highlight what's most important to me—spending time with my family. Catching up on their lives. Making sure I'm not missing anything important."
"What happens if you don't have that type of highlighter in your life?" I asked.
"I miss important things. I'm not aware of the details. I feel out of the loop. And I don't want to feel that way. I want to be connected to the people I love."
Three weeks later, he came back to me and said, "I thought about your highlighter analogy so much that I told my team and my boss that I wasn't checking email or taking phone calls on this vacation. It was one of the best weeks I've had in recent history."
If you truly want to make a shift, the signs are everywhere.