Americans need more time to laugh and have fun

March Madness will be over Monday, but it seems the chaos of classes has all but started again after spring break has ended. We thought we were busy before break, but all those assignments we forgot about last week have found a way to sneak up and are due right around the corner. As our stomachs keep turning into tighter knots and we begin to be consumed by the stress, let's try to hold onto the more easygoing side of life.

Today is April Fool's Day, which gives people all over the U.S. an excuse to act a little careless, be a little silly and hopefully get a good laugh in the end. As Americans, we often don't get enough time to relax and just do things that make us happy. Compared to other countries, the U.S. is low on the scale of average number of paid vacation days per year given to employees.  While the U.S., on average, has only 13 days, Italy has 42, France 37 and Germany 35.

For Americans, ages 25 to 54 with children, most of the time is spent on the job or sleeping to regain energy for more work. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, eight hours is reserved for work, 7.6 hours is used for rest and only 2.6 hours is reserved for leisure and sports. 

No wonder more than one in 20 Americans 12 years and older were found to have current depression, according to data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey for 2005-2006 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Web site.

We are literally worked to death so we can spend money on homes that we don't live in and buy items we can't play with. Our consumer-driven country that bombards us with advertisements makes us think life is all about work so we can have all the stuff that we end up not being able to use anyway. It ends up being a very frustrating and depressing situation.

We need to rethink how the world has told us we need to be. The way it is going right now, people aren't getting anything out of life. We need to make it a priority to find and do the things that we most enjoy. Maybe that can be finding a job you really like, but most likely it will be found somewhere else.

An example is getting a hobby and spending time doing it until you're great at whatever it is. Maybe it's drawing cartoon characters or going hiking or taking pictures. Find that something that makes you tick and give yourself the time to go after it. You might even find something you love doing so much and that you're so good at, is what you want to pursue for a career and it could change your life around for the better.

So, ride with the flow of April Fool's Day's lighthearted nature and be a little careless, be a little silly. You'll be a lot happier.