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Since a young age, I have been quite fascinated by maps and geography. I would study the world map every morning while eating breakfast, selecting cities to visit and travelling the world. The idea of new cultures, cuisines, societies, and habits always excited me. The sites to visit and the places to explore kept me longing for more. However, only a few people realize the immense benefits travel has to offer, which are many, from mental wellness to positive self-esteem and self-exploration. Travel can change your life. It changes your perception of the world, shapes your personality, and helps you enjoy your me-time. But the importance of travel goes far beyond that. This personal narrative explores why travel is important, the benefits of travelling, and why you should travel more often.
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So here is my story.
Growing up, I was fortunate enough to travel a lot, and travelling was always in my blood. My family loved traveling, and we journeyed across the length and breadth of our country, seizing every possible opportunity. By virtue of his job, my father travelled across the country and the continent. And so did we.
We had the opportunity to live in the rural hinterlands, urban conglomerations, and foreign countries. We lived in different towns, districts, and cities, settling and shifting like nomads. During my early years, we mainly travelled domestically, and that is how I developed this knack for travelling and realized the importance of travel. Then came international travel, which made me more hungry to explore the unseen.
And since then, there has been no looking back!
If you ask me why travel is essential and the benefits of travelling, I can give many reasons. The importance of travel, foremost, lies in the fact that it helps you grow as a person. It changes your life perspective, broadens your horizons, teaches you to manage your own finances and accommodations, and instils the ability to coexist with your fellow travellers.
Travelling has taught me how to survive with the least amount of clothing, food, and luxuries of life. It also gave me a good enough reason to save money and travel the world. As I travelled more, I imbibed that to travel is to live. Travel allowed me to spend quality time with myself, introspect, and navigate my emotions, ultimately helping me grow as a person.
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While the idea of travelling the world is a dream for many, unfortunately, it never becomes a reality for some. It was never easy to travel the world previously. But now, travel is easy. Thanks to high disposable income and easy access to travel. So, if you are living in this generation, you should consider yourself lucky. The importance of travel is realized if you make the most of your travels and see them translated into valuable experiences.
Speaking about it, I have compiled a list of reasons for the importance of travel, why travel is essential, and why you should travel more often.
So let us see the incredible benefits of travelling.
The Importance of Travel: Benefits of Travelling
Travel has really changed my life, and there are countless reasons why travel is important and why travel is good for you. But here are eight major benefits of travelling that I have personally witnessed.
1. Travel is freedom
Leaving home for the first time is absolute freedom as you can decide the course of your life for the period of your vacation. It gives you more confidence and independence to conduct your life without any boundaries set by others.
I felt this when I traveled to Hong Kong and Macau. The excitement, thrill, and adventure of my trip to these places are still alive in my mind. We were on our own, creating our own itineraries, marauding the cities, exploring the night markets, and hitting the buzzing clubs. We were as free as we ever wanted to be.
But all freedom invariably comes with some responsibility. You can be independent, free, and high on life. Still, you can’t be irresponsible, especially in a foreign land. And the first responsibility that comes with freedom is towards yourself and your fellow travellers.
Freedom should give you confidence, a sense of responsibility, and a positive attitude in life.
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2. Travel is empowering
Travel can give you all the authority, responsibility, and autonomy in making decisions, from planning your trip to making eleventh-hour changes while travelling. You are in complete control of your life and the journey ahead.
I remember my trips to Thailand, Dubai, and France, where we were clueless during the initial few days. But as the days passed, we became more confident and in control. We not only made last-minute changes but also managed our trip quite well. We handled our trip responsibly and learned to take control of our lives by being judicious.
Travel has really been empowering!
3. Travel helps you make new connections
Meeting new people from different parts of the world is an inevitable part of your travel journey. The random people you meet at the cafes and the bars, in your hotel and dorm, or in your group tour may well become a part of your life.
Conversation with your new friends can make you explore new perspectives in life. You realize how reality is different from what is projected in international news. You may recognize that, in the end, we all are humans with the same needs, wants, and emotions.
And some connections can really change you. I have made friends worldwide, from Russia to Bali, Singapore, and Europe. And all of them taught me something new. While my friends from abroad are welcome to stay with me during their trip to India, they have extended the same gesture. This bond is beautiful and unconditional. And that is the way life is supposed to be. Travel friendships are some of the most robust, unique, and positive relationships I have forged and cherish.
4. Travel gives you knowledge
Travel is all about exploring the cities, the people, the culture, the food, the art, the architecture, the landscapes, the society, and much more. As you travel, you see new civilizations, meet new people, relish local food, and explore local transport networks.
But this is not it. You also get to experience how different your culture is from the one you are currently participating in, in a new country. All of it makes you more sensitive to cross-cultural issues and widens your perspective.
While travelling to Russia, I was mesmerized to see their metro system-the oldest in the world and their grandiose architecture. I also had the opportunity to see the world’s most authentic and classical ballets, notably “La Bayadere” and “Swan Lake.” Travelling to Russia was a piece of actual knowledge. After my travel to Russia, my entire perspective changed towards that country. I now have friends from Russia, and we exchange our wisdom from time to time.
When you travel and explore people and cultures, negative stereotypes disappear. As the knowledge sets in, the acceptability seeps in. It breaks your bias, makes you more sensitive towards the cause of others, and makes you a better human.
5. Travel teaches you about minimalism
Travel is all about self-realization. It is all about surviving only with the essentials and doing away with excess. As you travel, you realize the bare minimum you need to survive yet still be happy and content. As they say, the more you own, the more it owns you. Travel teaches you minimalism, living with the bare minimum, and doing away with clutter.
6. Travelling makes you taste yummy cuisines
If you ask me the best thing about travelling, I would say the food! To me, travelling is all about tasting the yummiest cuisines and dishes from around the world.
There is no such thing as better than trying a typical local dish from a foreign country served classically and authentically. Eating local food is more than just satisfying your hunger pangs. Local food is fresh, unique, tasty, and has a history behind it. It is an experience in itself. People like me travel to places like Thailand and Europe again and again to relish their local dishes and delicacies.
In fact, I discovered Banoffee pie while travelling to London, and now I can’t live without it. I even learned the authentic Banoffee pie recipe. Courtesy of my travel!
7. Travel helps you creating memories
The importance of travel lies in the fact that travel helps you create memories that you may cherish for the rest of your life.
This is true for me, as well.
No matter how insignificant it may seem, the fact that you created memories and still cherish them keeps you going forward in life. In fact, many people travel to make those memories.
8. Travel gives you mental peace
Finding mental peace in the hustle-bustle of our exhausting, tiring urban life, where every day is a contest with ourselves, is rare. We try many things to attain peace and tranquillity, like yoga, meditation, mindfulness, and gratitude. We also try to de-stress by watching movies, working out, or indulging in outdoor activities. But nothing beats the benefits of travelling. This is where travel has proven to be a sure-shot stress buster and can help you in your quest for inner peace.
The mental health benefits of travelling
The importance of travel in helping you attain mental peace
1. Travel helps you stop looking around for inner peace while encouraging you to create inner peace within. Travel enables you to unwind from the monotonous everyday routine and helps clear your mind. It lets you clean your rusted lens and see through clearly.
2. If frustration is killing you, and you cease to see the road ahead, travelling can lead you through a dark tunnel. You can expect a considerable change in your attitude by being more physically and spiritually positive if you take up travel as a hobby.
3. Exploring and traveling help you with productive engagement in life. It enables you to overcome your past bad memories and keeps you away from brooding over what is gone. It helps you forget and move on in life.
4. In this fast-paced life, we tend to lose ourselves. We forget that we have a relationship with ourselves too. We become too busy to attend to our own needs, our interests, likes, and dislikes. But travel can help us rediscover ourselves and understand who we really are. The importance of travel is realized when we find time for ourselves, travelling away from our daily monotonous lives. It expands our boundaries and acceptance of others. As a result, you will start to love yourself and the people around you.
5. When we are too busy in our monotonous daily lives, we tend to overlook the most important priorities in life while chasing unreal and meaningless things. Travelling helps you clear your mind and indirectly helps you segregate the vital few from the trivial many. The importance of travel is that it gives you a reason to set your priorities in order.
6 surprising benefits of travelling
We talked about a lot of benefits of travelling. And it is clear it helps us keep our minds happier. But travelling can also have a tremendous impact on our physical wellbeing.
Here are seven surprising benefits of travelling that will make you travel again.
1. Travelling can prevent heart disease
As per a study, travelling can help prevent heart disease. The published study stated that people who do not travel as often as they should, are more likely to develop heart disease than those who do.
2. Travel helps you age better
What if I say that travelling can make you age slowly and gracefully? Yes, it is true. Travel can help you improve your mental well-being and, as a result, your stay happy. And when you stay happy, you live longer, and the adverse effects of age appear slower.
3. Travel eases your stress levels
It is proven that travel is a stress buster. But travelling not only helps reduce your stress but also enables you to beat any depression you have or prevent depression from onsetting.
So, you should take more vacations and create positive emotional levels.
4. Travel can boost your physical fitness
When you travel, you are active. You walk more than you do in your routine life. When you are in your regular life, you spend most of your time sitting, working, or even driving. But when you travel, you walk more than you usually do. Without you even realizing it, you walk miles doing site seeing.
5. Travel can help you get better sleep
When you are stressed, you sleep less and worry more. But when you are travelling, you are de-stressed and enjoy more. So, travel calms you down, feed your emotions positive and happy thoughts, and even makes you physically tired. As a result, you catch up with better quality and sound sleep.
So, when you travel, you sleep better.
6. Travel makes you active
When you travel, you are physically and mentally active as you are continually doing something or other. At times, you are planning, while at others, you are doing some adventure. And when you are at a holiday destination, you want to do it all. As a result, you become more active and smart!
To conclude I would like to say that you should travel for yourself, not for anybody else. Let the journey fulfill your inner void and help you heal from past traumas.
Travel lets you heal, forgive and accept yourself. It also helps you broaden your horizon, change your perspective, and advance in life. Travel is necessary for your transformation. It has the power to make you stronger in all aspects of your life.
No reason should stop you from travelling. If no one is around, you can go solo. And if you are in for some adventure, you can plan a road trip with your friends. But whatever it is you should travel more often!
I hope this post gave you all the reasons to travel again and more often as you know the real importance of travel.
If you know of more benefits of travelling, please share your thoughts with us. We would love to see them in the comments section below.
Happy travelling!
