"The real voyage of discovery consists not of seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes."
Woody -Bamboo tattoo artist. 28 years old. Railay, Thailand
A good friend of mine recently asked how I felt after being on the road for months. “Do you feel differently from when you first started?” I'd been reflecting on this more and more these days, coincidentally. Something I hadn’t really done since my departure. It's a subject that I wanted to share with others as I feel I haven't been so good in describing my experiences and whereabouts as well as I had initially intended. So I’ll try my best to convey what I’ve been feeling after 17 weeks away from home.
4 months ago today marks what, so far, has become the greatest adventure of my life. Since then I've summited the second highest mountain in Indonesia, watched the sunlight touch the tops of hundreds of pagodas as it rose in Myanmar, played volleyball with locals of a southern island in Thailand, zip-lined through jungle canopies in northern Laos, and throughout it all eaten incredible and often times questionable food while befriending countless wonderful people along the way. As I reflect on it all, my heart bursts with tremendous gratitude.
Like it was yesterday, I remember the nervousness that arose right before I confessed to my boss that after 4 years of employment I was going to quit my job, leave everything behind and wander the planet. The feelings of excitement and uncertainty as I finally boarded that plane and the liberation from the day to day routine and comforts that I was so used to are as clear to me now as they were then. My imagination ran wild with visions of foreign lands and presupposed events. Unsure of anything except the knowledge that my making of that decision would later become a milestone in the path of my life.
Similar to a romantic relationship though, traveling begins with a honeymoon phase. The butterflies in your stomach at first, becoming enamored with countless things on a daily basis and daydreaming of what the future holds. However, as we all know, these feelings can change. At first fascinating and mesmerizing, at some point there were only so many more temples, stupas and statues of Buddha that I could bear. Once enjoyable and appetizing, there were times that I felt that if I had one more plate of fried rice that I was just gonna snap. Although willing to do so with enthusiasm in the beginning, I found there were only so many ways you can tell someone where you're from and where you've been and where you’re going before you start to consider pretending you're a deaf mute. Blissfully ignorant initially, you learn to expect that anyone approaching you wants to sell you something. Where, through experience, you understand you’d be a fool by purchasing anything at it’s initial price.The romanticized visions and assumptions I had embarked with were just that. Ideal and unrealistic ideas of a world I expected to be easier and more enjoyable than my own.
That being said, however dismaying or irritating it seemed to become, I ultimately realized that these were all just lessons to be learned and the obstacles were merely exercises to be practiced and eventually overcome. I began to understand that I was given the opportunity to see myself in different lights, constantly in the face of unfamiliar environments and challenging situations to further discover facets of my own personality. I found myself in places where knowing the most practical language in the world was useless and still I progressed. Instead of looking at different cultures and people as novelty, I began to understand them by putting myself in their shoes and relating to them on a much deeper level. I realized that different people with different cultures and backgrounds are just different aspects of one other and I was no exception. I was being forced to learn about the world, it’s inhabitants and most importantly about myself.
In the process, I've gained an overwhelming appreciation for the things I have and the place I come from. Something that’s difficult to do when you know nothing else. I began to compare and contrast the life I was born into, the loving family that I’m blessed with, the country I am a citizen of, the opportunities I have, and all of the the benefits and detriments that come with them. There's a thing some of us do when we're unhappy with our situations and we fantasize about anything or everything else not seeing the that solutions lay right beneath our noses. It’s hard to see the forest from the trees and it isn’t until I found myself oceans away for months at a time that I understood this importance.
I do want to point out that it doesn’t necessarily take the same leap of faith for everyone to reach the same awareness, however, learning something from direct experience I find is the most tangible and effective way. Rather than, say, simply reading about why you should be grateful or understanding appreciation in an intellectual way. I really can't recommend it enough, that everyone should step out of their comfort zones and truly discover sides of yourself you didn't know existed. These are some of the things I've come to appreciate and everyday I awake with a renewed enthusiasm and thirst for knowledge and life strengthened with optimism.
All of that to say, these past 4 months of traveling through multiple countries and landscapes and cultures has been an experience more educational than any academic course and more valuable than any currency.
I tend to think back at that chalk board in that small Thai beach town that read, “Travel. This is the ONLY thing you buy that make you richer.” I couldn’t agree more.