Leaders! If you haven’t done it yet, it’s time to plan your next vacation.

Whether making your own plans or doing it with one or more partners, the mere act of considering options will expand your mind, create new possibilities in your life, offer an exciting period of anticipation, and begin to remind you in a concrete way that both you and your colleagues are people who need more than jobs in your lives.

The best part is that all those benefits come to you even before your vacation begins.

My wife, Rachel, and I visited friends Hans and Tanja recently in the Netherlands, and once we arrived, other benefits came every day—as well as lots of tasty Dutch cheese and bread. I’ll give you a few examples.

On our first full day, I wanted to sleep in as any jet-lagged traveler might, but I made the unreasonable decision to rise early with Hans and his daughter Rose to pitch in on her long-running apartment renovation in Rotterdam. As we assembled and installed Ikea kitchen counters, I was reminded how much we learn about each other when we tackle a project together. The very capable Hans admitted he usually works more quickly, while Rose, a recent graduate with an engineering degree, likes precision. “Measure twice, cut once” is a Dutch expression, too! As a team, we counted the day a success for making good progress without breaking anything or making a big mistake.

On another day, we met with a historian to tour the Jewish section of Amsterdam and visit the Holocaust Memorial. We took in a lot, for example that 107,000 Jews were sent to concentration camps from the Netherlands in the early years of the war. Tanja’s extended family lost 125 members. Fortunately, her mother was among the 5,000 who made it home when the war ended.

Seeing pictures from 85 years ago of buildings that once filled the Jewish section of the city, several of which are still recognizable today, reminded me how a city remains closely tied to its past, and yet is always moving on. The tour also brought into focus for me how fresh this terrible history was when our parents were raising us, only a dozen years after the war. At the memorial, where there’s a brick with the name of each Dutch Jew who was murdered in the camps, I was also struck by how many family names are familiar to me as American names, too.

On other days, we visited museums and cafes with about equal frequency and saw exhibits ranging from Vermeer to American Gospel music. Of course that included a stop at the Maritime Museum, which featured a virtual tour around the busy harbor of 17th century Amsterdam and a chance to step aboard the museum’s 158-foot replica of the Dutch East Indies Company ship Amsterdam.

Learning about the country’s history, I was impressed by the creativity, practicality, and persistence of Dutch people, never daunted by the need to create land where water had always prevailed. Their qualities no doubt derive from centuries of somewhat renegade status, often protected from larger European powers by the terrain of the boggy delta of the Rhine on which much of the country is built. I also became increasingly aware of the dark side of Dutch history, a legacy of colonial commerce, violence, and participation in the transatlantic slave trade. Balancing this somewhat is the fact that the Dutch are making a sustained effort to be transparent about their past—something we need to continue working on in the U.S. 

In sum, the trip proved to me again that the world is not a simple place: past, present, and future. But also, that when we focus on its many facets without the domineering lens of work and we engage in conversations with folks who have their own history and life experience, we can find a vacation superpower. As our brain takes in new information, it also refreshes and resets its circuitry.

Returning home to Rhode Island with a deeper knowledge and appreciation of our long-time friends, we’re also reminded of the opportunity to connect with people every day, to practice empathy, and to look deeper into the next conversation. 

Are you ready to plan your next vacation? It can be in city or country, on a beach or in a boat. Wherever you go, I recommend taking your brain along so it gets the benefits, too.

Have a great month.