I’ve learned so much about the world while travelling, it’s impossible not to. But for now I just want to tell you about the number one thing that has been reinforced, again and again, by every meaningful travel experience I have had.
When you spend an extended period of time outside of your normal routine, exploring, taking in wondrous sights, and discovering the astonishing variety of life that exists on our planet, it shifts your perspective on things. You realise that there is so much more out there.
The view from Poon Hill, Nepal
It isn’t just the endless physical possibilities you now know exist. More significantly, it is the depth of peace and the overwhelming feeling of aliveness you discover. The world becomes a so much more enchanting place, and you have a much deeper appreciation for all of it.
Monkeys in Hampi
It can be difficult to balance this new found sense of wonder with day to day life in a 9 to 5 job back home. I struggled with it several times after returning from long trips abroad. I needed the money, (mainly so I could go off and have more spectacular adventures!) but, more that that, I needed to slow down and enjoy the small pleasures in life.
I could no longer deny the importance of my day to day experience in the hope of experiencing more peace in the future.
I unequivocally had to live for the now.
This brought with it a whole heap of challenges, but my shift in priorities also led me to discover so many wonderful things that I wasn’t open to before. I got into yoga in a big way, I became a qualified massage therapist, I started making my own jewellery, I picked up my guitar again after years of neglecting it, and I even began writing songs.
I’ve now turned my jewellery making hobby into a business.
Now that I knew how much peace and beauty was available to be experienced in this world, I had to find a way to ‘live it’. To only have access to this seemingly magical realm when I was on holiday from real life was an impossible thought to bear. I experimented, failed more times that I could ever manage to relay to you, and gradually found more and more of this peace that I had been looking for, exactly where I was.
Someone tweeted the other day, and I forget who it was or the exact words, something about creativity being a “scavenger hunt for the soul”. Those 5 words really stuck with me. It certainly does feel that way sometimes, but my god it is worth it!!!!
Finding the treasure at the end of the rainbow! Photo: Iguacu Falls, South America
When it was just the shortest moments of peace, following so much of the absolute opposite, I feared I had chosen the wrong path. However, I must have known somehow that things would get better, because I kept trying. The more I learned how to get my monkey mind to cooperate and tune into my heart’s longings, and the better I became at expressing myself creatively, the more profound and longer lasting the feeling of inner peace was.
So I continue on my journey, collecting pieces of myself along the way. But now instead of desperately searching, I go wide-eyed in wonder on my quest, knowing that really, all of it is me. I have learned to live in the moment, content with where I am, amazed at where I have been, and excited for where I am about to go.
Ushuaia, the ‘southern-most city in the world’.
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