Travelling is not for everyone

With the raise and influence of Instagram, facebook and other social media, it is easy to feel less and think that you haven’t done anything in life. When you see a wanderlust travelers’ photo, you may think “Travelling is always a flawless experience”. When you see a fancy vacation posts, you may have pulled a paper and pen made your own bucket list. What people don’t know is that a lot of planning and budget goes behind these paradise visits. Many times, with a certain budget, you cannot afford the luxuries that you often see on social media, which does nothing but dampens your mood.

Yes, travelling is always a flawless experience for wanderlusts, who care about nothing but seeing the world with their own eyes and feel high on this feeling. However, traveling may not be as glamorous as it is made out to be. And who am I to say this? It’s not because I’m bitter I didn’t travel; it’s because I travel. While I’ve had my own reasons for traveling and don’t regret a second of it, travel is not always easy, luxurious, and does not necessarily make you a better person.

I’ve always felt compelled to travel to see different places and culture, experience a challenge, etc. I recognize that it’s 100% not for everyone. And that’s okay. Everyone has different passions, priorities, and life circumstances.

This post isn’t meant to be negative, it’s meant to provide a different perspective.

• Travelling will force you to get out of your comfort zone

A comfort zone is defined as “a place or situation where one feels safe, at ease, and without stress.” It’s that familiar bubble that we keep ourselves in to avoid any unexpected challenges life may throw at us. Travelling will be uncomfortable. It may give you anxiety and makes you sick when water and climate is changed.  When you are hungry, cold, dripping wet from the rain, puke your gut out due to motion sickness, trudging along carrying your backpack while trying to find your hostel, you tend to rethink your choices.

Everyone is not fit enough to travel. People suffer from motion sickness, can’t tolerate not having food on time or open to try different cuisine or sleep while travelling. Sometimes you will be in a situation to hold your bladder for a while. All these things won’t happen on daily routine and most people don’t enjoy the journey, even though they may enjoy for few minutes overall, they would have suffered more than they enjoy.

• It’s expensive and exhausting

Wow, you must make good money to travel like you do. This is the first thing people tell me. Well, then and only then, I’d be a rich traveller.  It’s not a glamorous lifestyle of travel and adventure as you see on social media post. Not everyone can afford travel. It’s true, a lot of affluent people travel. That doesn’t mean travel must be expensive though. Can it be? Absolutely! Does it have to be? Definitely not.

Not everyone has that privilege in life because it’s not just the cost of the travels. I paid for 100% of my travels, but it requires a huge amount of planning and budgeting throughout the year. I would rather travel cheaply for longer and more often than travel lavishly for a short amount of time. That might not be the case with all.

A lot of us have traveled as a child with our family and friends for vacations to distant places. It has been fun for us while we were under our parent’s care and affection, who made sure we were comfortable throughout our journey. However, as we grow up and travel with our own hard-earned money, things may not be as well as they were before.

• Some people simply have other priorities

          I choose travel over owning a nice car. I chose travel over saving my money for normal adult things, like shopping or buying a house. I chose wearing a same dress in different trips than wearing a different dress in the same trip. I preferred the experiences over owing a nice thing. Your preference and priorities may not be same.

There are also other factors to take into account. For instance, some people have loved ones to take care of. Being a parent also makes it a bit more of a challenge to travel. I know there are plenty of parents that travel with their little ones, even long term, but that doesn’t mean every parent can do this. Some people prefer to avoid talking to total strangers unless necessary. Some may have a great affection towards their home turf, wherever that may be at the moment. Why do people travel? a) To visit family? b) To spend time with friends? They travel because their motivation is the love for people and not for a place.

• Expectation from travel

What do you expect out of travel? This is probably the important question you need to ask self before planning to travel. Most People look forward to the vacation as an ideal time of their life and they would like to forget the burdens of daily life during vacation. They don’t want to plan anything except deciding place, they generally connect with tour guide to take care of everything. Planning an itinerary, budget, booking commute tickets, hotel, food, they want everything to be taken care of. So now the big question is “Are you a traveler or tourist?”

If you don’t know what to expect in travel, then this experience may be tiresome for you. If you are interested in an Art gallery or Architectural beauty and if you go for cultural tour visit you may not like it and it will spoil the whole image. For some it may only just be sitting in different place and location and relaxing. So be sure on what to do and expect or else you will end up saying “Oh! its just a view”

 

• Don’t judge the “less traveled”

Try not to judge people who don’t travel or aren’t as well-travelled as you are. Keep in mind how lucky you are that you are able to travel and that it’s a gift. Personally, I think it’s always good to stay humble and be thankful.

Travel is ultimately only an interest or choice. There are plenty of things in life you may enjoy. May be like Running, Swimming, curling up in bed with a good book, and spending evenings in the company of good friends are a few of them. It is often said that we are all just trying to find happiness at the end of the day, and travel is one of the many ways. If one finds it somewhere else, who are we to convince them otherwise?