Travel Changes You More Than Talk Therapy

Ever step off a plane and realize your inner compass has swung to a new north? We dig into why purposeful travel can catalyze the kind of change that resolutions rarely deliver, blending lived experience with clear psychology to explain how novelty, presence, and role-shedding rewire the brain.

I share how walking the Camino reset my priorities and helped me defend a morning routine that anchors my days. From there, we explore four science-backed levers: travel breaks the illusion of “only one life,” forces attention out of autopilot, temporarily removes social labels so you can hear your true desires, and integrates insight faster because the body learns through movement and emotion. We compare therapy and travel as complementary tools—therapy explains who you are, travel shows who you could be—and map the exact moments where on-the-road practice becomes at-home change.

If you’re ready to design a life shift, we walk through practical steps to make travel intentional: choose destinations that mirror the pace you want, protect white space on the itinerary, try solo travel to clarify preferences, and set two concrete post-trip actions before you unpack. Whether your goal is a gentler schedule, healthier boundaries, or a new direction entirely, one well-crafted journey can move the needle from thinking to doing.

Subscribe for more Solo Travel Adventures for Christian women, share this episode with a friend who needs a nudge, and leave a review with the one habit you plan to protect after your next trip. Your story might spark someone else’s first step.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And Big Question
• 0:37 Why Travel Sparks Major Life Shifts
• 2:15 A Camino Story And New Priorities
• 3:54 The Psychology Behind Travel Change
• 5:35 Breaking Autopilot And Staying Present
• 6:59 Dropping Roles To Hear Your True Self
• 8:28 From Insight To Lasting Integration
• 10:33 Use Travel Intentionally To Change
• 12:15 Solo Travel As A Catalyst
• 13:12 Invitation To Coaching And Next Steps

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Welcome to Solo Travel Adventures. I'm Cheryl Esh, your host and travel coach for Christian women. Welcome to today's episode. Have you ever noticed when you come back from a trip feeling different or changed somehow? I want to talk today about how that is possible and why um researchers and a therapist believe that travel can make a difference. So have you ever returned from a trip that really had an impact on you and you felt different, you approached things differently, you looked at things differently. Well, uh how people change more after a travel or trip than therapy. Well, there's a reason for that. Now I'm not saying therapy is wrong and you should discount any of it. Therapy can be very important depending on your situation or what you might be going through. But researchers have noticed a strange pattern. Major life shifts opt often happen not so much after years of therapy, but often after one travel experience, a strong travel experience. So people will come back from a trip with profound revelation about their lives, often prompting job changes, ending relationships that didn't serve them, moving maybe, or finally starting something they've postponed most of their life. And so it gives them this fresh perspective, is what I'm seeing. And there's just so much that can happen when you travel that really does change your perspective. I've noticed that in myself, um, coming back, especially after walking the Camino and just noticing the different pace of life over there in Europe compared to the US and just how I wanted to capture that. And so when I did return, I did make a priority of you know making sure that I was creating my days and my time and my schedule how I desired. And so I can say that after that trip, that is something positive that came out of it. Um, I decided to start, you know, saying no to things that would interfere with sort of the crafting of how I wanted my day to look. For example, um, not taking on too much work, not allowing things to interfere with. I have a morning routine that I just I love, I love so much, and I protect that. And so I created a work, uh, work-life balance, so to speak, around that. And I will have to say, that was definitely when I came back from walking the Camino. I made that a priority because I saw, you know, there was that that shift that I noticed when I was traveling. So I had a revelation about my life. And, you know, it kind of snowballed with some other things as well. So, in psychology terms, here's why this happens. So people come back and they're all changed, not just physically, you might see that, especially if someone has gone to the beach, they have this glow, they are uh refreshed, hopefully. But in psychology terms, when people come back and they make these major life shifts, um they believe that it's because travel breaks the illusion that their current life is the only possibility. They see other possibilities, they realize there's other things they could be doing that is more fulfilling. So therapy works with words, and you know, you might have a therapist that likes to do role-playing scenarios, whereas travel works directly with experience. And experiences are really in our brains, I think really can shape how we approach life. Secondly, travel forces your brain out of autopilot. So you're being thrown into new cultures, new environments, new sites, new language, new food, and your nervous system can't rely on your old patterns or scripts. So decisions are happening really fast, and they're based on new information, not your old patterns of thinking. One thing I love about travel is that it does take me out of this autopilot. You know, often we may drive to work and wonder how we got there because we were on such autopilot and not really being in the moment where I feel travel keeps you in the moment. It really you have to, especially if you're experiencing new things. So this is gonna create, you know, just different um brain synapses and wiring when we're doing new things and not relying on the old information that we have. And thirdly, travel temporarily removes your current social roles. For example, mom, partner, employee, daughter, whatever uh your social roles are in your everyday life, on the road, these labels are dropped. You can be whomever you want to be and finally turn and tune into your real desires. Therapists note that a loss of identity pressure allows people to hear what their inner self is saying and not what is expected of them. And so this shift can also uh kind of help change your your brain networks uh linked to this identity thing. So when we stop looking at our old self, old stories, um, we stop rehearsing the same version of ourselves. And so we have this new context of of us. And so there's a major shift that even is happening in our brains when um you know travel removes those titles, those social titles that we often carry around with us. I mean, you could basically reinvent yourself when you're traveling. You can be whomever you want, you could even make up a story if you wanted, um, especially if you're traveling solo. Maybe you make up this grand story that you're meeting, you know, somebody. Fourthly, data shows that insight gained during travel integrates faster in your life because your body is learning through movement and emotions, not just through reflections. So therapy helps to explain who we are and focuses more on sort of our past events, why we are the way we are, right? Oh, you know, thinking about mother-father, you know, any kind of past issues uh do shape us for sure. Whereas travel shows us who we could be. And so it doesn't, you know, travel, as long as we're not ruminating on sort of our past, that travel keeps you, as I mentioned earlier, it keeps you in the present moment. And so it really could show you a new side of you and who you could be, who you want to be. Um, that's the realization that travelers experience that often causes them to change their lives. So again, therapy is wonderful. I've been to a therapist many times throughout my life, off and on, depending on the season I've been in. Um, and it has been helpful in many ways. But I have found uh once I've gotten over some of those big hurdles in therapy, that travel has actually propelled me even further in providing all these um reasons, you know, more brain kind of reasons of why travel can, you know, come back and change your life. You you kind of had those those revelations about something that could be changed, something new. Um, you have a new perspective for sure on your life. And um, you know, travel really does do that. And it gives you also, in my opinion, it gives you the space and opportunity to to f you know, kind of heal from anything and move past it. A lot of times we get such as I mentioned earlier, on this autopilot kind of uh you know trajectory, right? And so it pulls you out of I said point number two, it pulls your brain out of that autopilot, that old way of thinking, and also gives you the space to just be and to possibly uh heal and reflect on just how you want to um what do you want to be calm and how you want to change yourself. Have you ever noticed that there was one trip that you came back from that just changed you in some way? Did it shift your direction more than the years of just thinking about changing? You know, we all in the beginning of the year, I think about these goals that we set, these things that we want to do with our lives to change our lives, whether it's a new habit or try something new or become something new. And we often sit and spend so much time thinking about these changes and trying in our own determination and will to try to accomplish it when often a very intentional trip could move that needle further than just thinking about it. So I want you to think, is that you do you want to move the needle on changing the way you think? Did you do you feel like you want to actually change your life in some way? Have you tried using travel intentionally for that reason? Now, some of this will happen just automatically and your brain will have to make a shift. But there's also components where if you are also intentional about your travel, where you go, um, it could accelerate some of this, these changes that happen in your brain and in your physiology, your body as well. And so I encourage you, if you have not considered a solo trip for this year, that that is something that you will do for yourself. It will be life-changing. And I know we always say that, and it doesn't always turn out to be like unicorns and rainbows kind of happy ending changes. Sometimes those changes could just make you realize something that's not working in your life at home and make that slight change, or you could fall in love with that place that you just want to travel. And maybe you do want to actually move, maybe not to that place, but it got you thinking about why are you stuck in this one place and opens up all these doors of opportunity maybe for you. So think about that. But I'm also here to help with my coaching program. You can reach out to me, hello at Cherylbeckesh.com, and discuss a coaching program that I have, or go to my website at Cherylbeckesh.com and find out more about it. But I encourage you, I really want to see more women utilize solo travel, um, not just for the fun of it, but also to benefit, as I mentioned here on this episode. Benefit mentally and maybe even spiritually for yourself. Sisters, get out there and have that solo adventure.