Creativity, diary entries, psychotherapy, meditation … Most likely, you are familiar with these tools of self-knowledge. But believe me: it’s hard to find a more stunning and powerful way to see your inner world than traveling alone (Solo journey). We will discuss in this article what such a test will bring.
Why is this all?
People often lack an official reason to make a quantum leap. But it’s true, a useful thing. The official reason can be safely voiced to friends, colleagues and just onlookers who will certainly try to dissuade you from solo travel. Yes, get ready: in the eyes of others you will look extremely ridiculous. He lived for himself, became overgrown with routine and justified hopes, but here … You run away somewhere with a backpack and you can’t even say for sure when you will return. Yes, it won’t be easy. We sympathize with you. And then we rejoice, because there is freedom ahead!
Catch three official reasons strong enough to justify jumping into the depths of your solo journey:
- I feel an irresistible desire to initiate major changes in my life.
- I need to test myself to understand who I am.
- I want to learn to be honest with myself and understand what I really want.
Solo journey
Take responsibility
Solo travel is a new manifestation of you. Unexpected and beautiful. There is a great responsibility here: if you drag along “old” patterns of behavior that need to be radically revised, there is a risk that the new experience will become a reflection of them. Then why is this all? Deliberately surrender yourself to the practice of change. Observe what is happening inside and outside.
And there is something else important. If you decide on a solo trip, be sure to say: “Everything that happens from this minute onwards is completely my responsibility.” Listen carefully to this phrase. Neither a loved one, nor parents, nor society – no one is responsible for your decisions, only you. What if you spend a whole year on the road? You need to be prepared for the fact that the past environment will disappear and no rescuers will pull you out of the jungle of new experience. Only you will decide what to do next. If it was not life, but the National Geographic program, commenting on your adventures, the host would say: “He voluntarily pulled himself out of his usual habitat, and everything changed.”
Remove Unnecessary
As you travel, try to pay attention to your value judgments and reactions. You will be amazed at how cleverly your brain hangs tags on strangers, drawing their biographies in a split second. All this dubious analytics lasts endlessly, from morning until late at night, until at some point a stranger will surprise you to the core, showing qualities that you did not expect from him at all. You will learn to see the actions of people, and not your fabrications about them.
Solo journey
The same principle will work for yourself. Surely you are used to giving yourself certain assessments. Continue:
I am a person with …
I’m afraid …
I don’t like it when …
Now cross it out. Habitual reactions and behavior patterns will literally have to be thrown into the trash heap. Get ready for the constant need to reconfigure your personality in order to adequately respond to spontaneous changes. Each adaptation that you make, responding to new conditions, will become a facet of your new personality.
The more often you practice changes, the more your internal management system is ready for big challenges. Perhaps a muscle training look works well here. Start small: today you decide to stay at a hostel for the first time, next time you go to a music festival and sleep in a tent at the edge of the forest. After several months of such training, you can go, for example, to South America and study Spanish for six months, adopting the experience of another culture.
Is it scary?
Reflecting on the topic of solo travel, it is quite fair to ask: “Isn’t it scary to travel kilometers in an unfamiliar country, and even alone?” Scary, of course. And that’s why you need to try!
You will have to face countless constraints and internal attitudes. Being alone is an extremely uncomfortable story. Coming to a new city, you will need to start all over again – after all, the situation will completely change. Think back to your first day at school and multiply that excitement by a hundred. Yes, you will certainly be scared of something, but be sure to keep in mind the fact that there will be many situations when you can overcome everything. This is much more important.
Loneliness
On the one hand, on a solo journey you will be alone with yourself, on the other – even in three months of the journey you will meet as many new people as you have never met in your entire life. True, another test awaits you: for a long time you will be far from your loved ones. Although even in this melancholy lies an inexpressible charm.
But in everyday life we often feel lonely and seek spiritual closeness. Solo travel heals the longing for social connections (which sometimes leads to questionable contacts) and teaches the art of being alone. You will feel the healing effect and special lightness of being when you share your story with a person on the other side of the world, and then listen to his truth, looking for the intersection of destinies and listening to the wisdom of the heart.
Happiness
The therapeutic effect of solo travel is to tune your inner world. The road will bring answers: what is really good for you, what you want right now, and what needs to be left on the sidelines. Try your happiness! Maybe on the way it will manifest itself in a completely different way than in the usual environment. You will understand what people, places and activities make you happy.
