Path #8 Lessons from Travel
Applications for Our Daily Life
Travel is like uncorking a bottle of champagne, once unleashed many things come gushing out, both intended and unintended. Some of us may choose to keep our travel “corked,” while others wish to experience its full gusto and let the lessons learned flow where they may. The lessons of travel may be simple, such as getting away from our ordinary life or renewing our relationships with family or friends. Or the lessons may be multi-faceted, such as undergoing a major transformation in one’s life that would have been considered unfathomable a few months earlier. Although travel has the capacity to teach us many lessons, we need to be able to uncork its clues and share its gusto.
Alaskan glacier, US, photo Denise Ames
"Our happiest moments as tourists always seem to come when we stumble upon one thing while in pursuit of something else." - Lawrence Block
Chinese girls, photo Denise Ames
I have reaped many lessons while traveling that have had a profound impact on my life. Each individual may experience lessons differently, but they can expand one’s consciousness beyond the comforts of everyday life. A few that particularly resonate with me include appreciating beauty, learning flexibility, encountering the sublime, feeling empathy, and managing expectations.
Lesson #1. Embracing Beauty
To absorb beauty during my travels, I need to be in an open and receptive frame of mind. Being angry, inpatient, judgmental, or arrogant erects road blocks that prevent me from absorbing the beauty that travel brings my way. I have many examples I could share with you, and I am sure you have many that stand out with you as well. Remembering to consciously be aware of beauty is one of the lessons that travels reminds me of.
Lesson #2. Learning Flexibility
To absorb the subtle messages from travel, I find that I need to be flexible and recognize that my habits, customs, and norms are not the only ones in the world. But that is often hard to do when there is a clash of values between traveler and host. Intransigence, arrogance, and blindness to what is in front of me are obstacles to learning the vital lesson of flexibility.
Lesson #3. Encountering the Sublime
When traveling, I am grateful when I have an encounter with the sublime. According to Wikipedia, “in aesthetics, the sublime is the quality of greatness, whether physical, moral, intellectual, metaphysical, aesthetic, spiritual, or artistic. The term especially refers to a greatness beyond all possibility of calculation, measurement, or imitation.” Whether it is in nature, an encounter with a group or individuals, or visiting a religious institution, the sublime can pop up in unexpected circumstances. The key is to be open to its presence.
“The purpose of life is to live it, to taste it, to experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experiences.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
Lesson #4. Feeling Empathy
Empathy is the ability to leave one’s own cultural baggage behind and mentally walk a few steps in another person’s shoes. Empathizing involves knowing enough about another person’s values and thought patterns, and to be able to imagine what that person is thinking or feeling as s/he experiences an event, makes a decision, or considers an issue. Empathy is a high-level intercultural skill because it requires us to not only recognize that different perspectives exist, but also to have the ability to choose which perspective best suits us individually. Perspective-taking is the ability to recognize that each of us has a culturally based view of the world that is not universally shared. To feel empathy, travelers need to understand other peoples’ situations, their beliefs and values, and their norms of behavior, and then try to think about what the other person would feel in a particular situation. A key attribute of empathy is a traveler’s ability to put his/her cultural perspective aside for a few minutes, and try to see the world through the other person’s cultural perspective.
Lesson #5. Managing Expectations
An important lesson I have learned from my travels is that I often have misplaced expectations. I have certain ideas about what my travel is supposed to be like and I am disappointed if the trip does not match them. In fact, my expectations are often out of line with the reality of my traveling situation. There are many different reasons as to why I have placed undue emphasis on my unrealistic expectations, but the lesson to be learned is that I need to be flexible and adaptable to what may show up during my travels rather than my preconceived notions.
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A goal when traveling is to be flexible, and let the flow of circumstances teach me valuable lessons. Unforeseen circumstances keep me on my toes and prevent me from getting too confident in my decisions or observations. I like it (sometimes, at least) when my assumptions are challenged and I have to confront a different reality. Sometimes it is a good lesson to have my comfort zone breached, and to have to face something unexpected or unusual.
Beach on the Baltic Sea, Germany, photo Denise Ames