What is Leisure and Recreation?

In my mind, leisure is a more relaxed form of recreation. Leisure is taking time to unwind from a hectic day or a hectic week and give yourself the rest that you need in order to tackle the next task. To me, leisure is lounging around the house in fuzzy socks and a sweatshirt watching a movie after finishing loads of homework and a weeks worth of sport practices. It seems difficult to differentiate leisure from lazy, in my opinion. However, everyone needs resting periods in order to maintain a healthy lifestyle. We can't go 100 mph 24/7, we need rest to balance us out.

On the other hand, recreation is another option that we have in filling our free time. Whereas leisure allows us rest from our work, recreation allows us fun in between our work. To me, recreation is pursuing sports and outdoor activities of any kind. Soccer, track, snowboarding, hiking, camping, sledding, tubing, swimming, and biking are ways that I exercise recreation. As stated in the article, recreation is a way for us to blow off steam from work and burn up our pent up energy in a fun way.

Overall, leisure and recreation have great differences in connotation to me, however, I believe that restful leisure and playful recreation are both needed in order to maintain balance in our lives.