“ I’m in love with cities I’ve never been to and people I’ve never met.”  –  John Green

Start Where You Are

I’m not sure where else you would start, nevertheless this seems like good advice.  Recently, a friend told me that he had never left the state of Wisconsin until he was in his 20s.  He gradually started to realize that he would like to see more of the world but he didn’t know how to do it.  Crossing the state line was an accomplishment, and then he worked his way up from there until his future wife got him to go to Kenya on a mission trip.  Here’s the point though:  If crossing the state line is the next step in your personal journey, then do it and be proud that you did.  Wherever you are, whatever it is, whenever it’s right, that’s your step.  That’s what I mean by starting where you are.  For years I wanted to travel overseas; as a high school foreign exchange student, a year abroad in college, a trek across Europe after graduation.  But I didn’t do any of it.  I didn’t know how, and I couldn’t muster up the courage or the energy.  I was 30 years old before I left North America with my first wife showing me how to get on a plane and go, and I’m still starting where I am, finding my next step.   

The Arlanda Express at Stockholm Central Station moments before whisking me off to the airport, May 2016

Learn About Travel

Travel is both simple and complicated, depending on the trip.  Where should I go?  How do I get there?  What flights should I book?  How do I get around once I’m there?  Where do I stay?  How much will it cost?  Will my phone work?  Do I need insurance?  Should I rent a car?  How will I communicate?  What do I pack?  You get the picture.  The more you learn, the more comfortable you will be.  You bite off a little bit at a time and add on to what you know.  Or if you have a high tolerance for launching yourself into the unknown, that’s ok too.  I learn by doing, and every time I travel I learn something else.  My last trip, I forced myself to learn the public transit system in each of the four cities I visited as soon as I arrived.  It can be a little challenging to master the nuances of the buses, trams, and trains, and I decided to make this my goal.  This is how I learn, and I’ll focus more on that during my future travels.

Vancouver skyline over English Bay, August 2018

Learn About Yourself

I hope that you already know a lot about yourself.  When you apply this to traveling, it expands one’s knowledge.  You learn how you prefer to travel, where you prefer to stay, how structured you want your trip to be, who you want to travel with, how long you want to be gone, and many other things.  I flew to Ho Chi Minh City in southern Vietnam and flew home from Hanoi, one thousand miles to the north, three weeks later.  During those weeks, I had no lodging nor transportation booked or planned.  I didn’t know what towns I was going to visit.  And I made it just fine.  I learned a lot about logistics and faith and loneliness and strength.  I also came home with a huge dose of self-confidence in my ability to navigate the world, my world, our world.  Something about that particular trip has stuck with me because it happened at the right time in my life to impact me in a profound way.  From technicalities to language barriers to personal growth, travel is an amazing teacher!