The World is Waiting For Us
When I was growing up, my family had “reading teas.” A reading tea (or dinner as the Americans say) is when everyone in my family had a really good book to read and all four of us, my mum, dad, brother, and I, sat around the table, devouring literature and spaghetti. I gorged myself on high fantasy, stories about exotic far off lands, beautiful landscapes, and wondrous cities and nations with rich histories and cultures. My lust for adventure, novelty, and learning about culture and history was cemented at a young age.
In high school, I took electives that focused on art, literature, history, and architecture. I remember my high school humanities teacher showing us an incredible world, ranging from Sophocles to Latin etymology to gothic architecture. Later, I studied art history with a teacher who used to work for Disney. In addition to learning about Lascaux and Altamira, Bernini, and Van Gogh, she also taught us about the “Disney smile!” For my undergraduate degree, I studied classics and humanities. I desperately wanted to see these things in real life, not just as pictures in a text book or slides on a projector.
I have moved a great deal throughout my life. I was born and grew up in Australia and moved to California when I was a teenager. Later, I got married and my now ex-husband and I moved to Indiana in my late twenties to do my doctorate in clinical psychology. For people unfamiliar with the United States, California and Indiana are very different in culture and attitude, so, although they are both within the United States, they feel foreign. Moving periodically has left me with a sense of impermanence. I have accepted that there is a natural ebb and flow to relationships and circumstances and, unlike many of my friends, I didn’t grow up in a setting that led me to believe that I needed to stay in one place my whole life.
When I met my now ex-husband, we had plans to travel, and I thought we were both on the same page about that. For a number of reasons this didn’t materialize. I think, ultimately, we didn’t share the same vision. My desire to travel was much deeper than his and he held a different set of values closer to his heart. Travel wasn’t the main reason we separated, but our divorce has allowed me to reconnect with a core desire – to experience as much as I can of what this world offers!
It’s only been in the last two years that I’ve come into a position to travel. I’ve grown in my career and am financially stable. I also work remotely which makes travel far more feasible. I have no partner or pets to plan for.
For me, solo travel isn’t just about experiencing new places and new cultures. It’s shifting within to discover myself, find autonomy, and engage in a rich self-growth process. It is living a life of excitement. To some degree, it has been part of a healing process following my divorce and establishing how I want my future to look.
“Solo travel isn’t just about experiencing new places and new cultures.
It’s shifting within to discover myself, find autonomy, and engage in a rich self-growth process.”
As a psychologist, one of the things I see in my clients is a sense of not living, or rather, living a life without purpose and meaning. Exploration, adventure, and learning through travel, whether solo or with others, can all be ways in which we find meaning and happiness. I would love this blog to help someone start their journey with solo travel. I’m definitely not a travel expert so we can move through this process together – trial and error!
Let’s learn together, explore, have some adventures, and share our experiences. Perhaps you might find yourself living a life that feels more authentic, feeling free, and developing a deeper connection with yourself. Perhaps it’s not that deep and you just want to explore the world. Whatever our motivations, there is a lot of life to experience and I don’t want any of us to miss out!
