Finding Healing Through Solo Travel

In today’s episode, I’ll be reflecting on my experience with solo travel and how it’s shaped my understanding of self-care. I’ll touch on the fears that often come with traveling alone, and how moving through them can lead you beyond surface-level comfort into a more challenging, transformative kind of self-care. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hello and welcome to Stories and Self-Care. I'm your host, Daniela, and I am here today by myself. It's a little strange doing this alone, but I thought that in the spirit of solo travel, I would be brave and do a solo episode. So here we are. So today, this episode is called Finding Healing Through Solo Travel. I'll be sharing my experiences with traveling alone and how it's become a very empowering and necessary form of self-care for me. I'll get into some fears around solo travel and some ways to prepare and just some ways that you can embrace the parts of yourself that are resilient, smart, and able to conquer your goals independently. So before I begin, I usually ask myself and my guest how we plan on taking care of ourselves today. So I'll start by saying that this is it. This episode is my self-care plan today. You'll you'll see, you'll hear during this episode. I talk a lot about how self-care isn't always easy. Sometimes it's it's about doing something hard. So this is me doing something hard today and challenging myself. So this is my self-care thing, and we'll see how it goes. Maybe after, you know, I'll reward myself by going for a walk or probably just call someone and just allow myself a little time for connection. But I'm gonna start by sharing what motivated me to do this episode. I recently came back from a solo trip to Taiwan and Singapore, and I just in coming back, I just felt like what would be a better episode than one about traveling alone. Um, just for reference, some other places that I've gone to by myself include Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, Germany, Netherlands, France, Dominican Republic, and Hawaii. I also lived in South Korea on my own briefly. And I've done lots of solo travel within the US. So I'll be talking a lot about international travel alone in this episode, but a lot of the concepts apply either way. So why is solo travel important to me? Why has this become a necessary form of self-care for me? Well, I've always lived by the concept that life is too short. My mom became sick when she was 38 years old. I was maybe 14, and she got she was diagnosed with Luke Earriggs disease, which I've talked about on previous episodes. I'll talk about it for many more to come because it was just a really big part of my life. But I've I've always just kind of lived by that. Life is too short. We are here for a short ride, and I will always advocate for a living now. It's great to save for retirement, be smart, do all the money things, but live. Live now while while it's here and while while you can. I also feel like if I wait for other people, I'll be waiting forever. I've always just felt that way. You know, when you're talking to your friends and oh yeah, we'll we'll do this trip, uh, let's let's go next year or the year after that, and then it's years and it still doesn't happen. I just decided one day that's that's that's not gonna be it anymore. Um, when people are ready, we can we can go places, but until then, I'm also ready now, so I can do that now by myself. Um and I also think traveling alone is important to me because it's for me, I feel like just experiencing other places and people and cultures, it really just adds perspective to the different ways that life can be lived by just looking at how people treat each other, how people treat the environment, how people use outdoor spaces and how people treat animals, just seeing all these things across different cultures, just really gives me an opportunity to kind of reflect and and think about you know what what my priorities are in my life and what are areas that I I need to work on. So uh one quick example. When I was in Taiwan, these these two, there were these two men on bicycles, just street, you know, bicycles, and bumped into each other and nothing serious, it wasn't a major accident, but they fell. And I was very close to it, but I just kind of did the you know wide eye thing and like ooh, like, you know, keep walking but stare. I think not to make excuses, right? But but I I do think that having lived in New York for so long, there is kind of this culture where it's kind of like, you know, stay in your lane if you see something, like and it you kind of keep walking, you don't want to get involved, everything's so so crazy there. And I see that kind of follow me sometimes when I go to other places. And then I saw this this other guy come over and he just helped one of the guys off of his bike and just was just helping them get up from the ground. And I was like, why wasn't that my first instinct? Why wasn't that the first thing I thought to do? So I know that seems like a small and silly example, but that's just one of many examples of how it kind of reminds me to reevaluate, you know, simple things like kindness and just literally extending a handout to someone else when they fall off their bicycle. So those are some. So, you know, just life being too short, feeling like if I wait for other people, I'll be waiting forever, and then just kind of observing how people in other cultures and and places treat each other differently in their environment. Some fears that I want to address that come with solo travel are some fears or concerns. I don't have enough money, I don't have enough time, personal time, or PTO at work, I don't have child care, I have a health issue. Then there's thoughts of what if I get injured? What if I need medical attention? What if I get kidnapped or assaulted? What if I get lost? What if I get bored and I don't want to feel lonely? And I'll tell you what I'm not gonna do. I'm not gonna go through all these fears and say, these are excuses. If you really want something, you can get after it. I'm not gonna do that. I'm not a parent. I'm not gonna lecture someone on how they can find childcare if they really want it. Like I'm here to simply say that these fears are valid. I experience them regularly. It's it's still they're ongoing, right? I also realize that these fears don't go away. You just kind of learn how to work with them. I will say that, you know, I would just encourage people when you find yourself having these fears, just to be really honest with yourself and examine, you know, is this truly my reason for not doing this? Or is there, could there be avoidance of a more deeply rooted issue? Is there some self-sabotage going on, right? Like I don't, I don't deserve this. I don't I don't deserve a wonderful trip alone, right? So just just try to examine it, right? That's that's that's my only encouragement or or workaround with that. And I think that, you know, as far as the loneliness, that's a big one I hear a lot. And I think you can kind of learn to embrace time alone by maybe starting with some solo dinners or some solo dates. I do that a lot. You know, I always encourage people to take yourself on a date and then just work your way up to a full trip. And I think that's where the self-pair self-care part comes in, just working through those fears and obstacles. Like I said before, self-care isn't always fuzzy and soft and easy. Sometimes it's about small but hard efforts to connect with a higher version of yourself. But don't get me wrong, I always encourage like a comfy reward after doing the hard stuff. But so for me, what makes traveling alone a form of self-care as opposed to just like a fun thing to do, it brings up a couple different themes I want to touch on. Uh, the first one being independence. So addressing some of those fears that I just mentioned forces me to take some risks and to challenge myself, which for me, I do see that as self-care. Reminds me that I'm independent, reminds me that I can set my own goals and I can achieve them. Reminds me that I'm capable and resourceful, that I I can, I am able to take care of myself, right? And just encountering things like figuring out transit alone, uh figuring out where to go, getting injured, needing medical care. These are all things that, you know, it just reminds me, because for me, I'm gonna talk about getting sick a lot, because that's my biggest fear, and it's something that always happens when I travel. So for me, proving to myself that, hey, I can take care of myself, you know, these are not things that should stop me from living. That's that really just speaks to like my independence and helps me feel feel strong and you know, resilient. For quick example of that, I'm always really nervous about long flights because I'm honestly just always worried I'm gonna get sick on the plane. And I think it comes from I used to do a lot of volunteer work in Nicaragua and I used to get violently ill like every time I went. And so I've had a lot of experiences just getting sick in other countries. So of course, the last thing I'm gonna do is get sick on a plane, right? Nobody wants that. On this last trip when I was coming back from Taiwan, I was on a 13-hour flight. I had nine hours left, and I just I felt so sick, and I started to panic. And I was like, oh my god, I have nine more hours left. I was like, okay, like we got this, we prepared for this, we got the emergency travel medicine kit. I got up, spoke to a flight attendant, and I said, Hey, like, can you help me out? So she kind of she let me sit. I guess there was a row like where they could sit and like take rests and stuff. So she let me sit by myself back there. She heated up a water bottle for me to use as like a heating pad. And just those simple acts alone, I just felt like okay. I stayed there, slept for like five hours, and I was like, okay, like I can I can do this. You know, all I had to do was ask for a little bit of help, but I'm here, I figured it out. I also was forced to conquer my uh phobia of using the bathroom on airplanes, so got over that hump as well. So okay, so what another theme that kind of goes into, you know, like what makes traveling alone a form of self-care is this theme of presence and growth. As much as I don't like the planning part of solo travel, I know some people really get into it. I'm not a fan. I I don't, I really don't like it, but once I'm there, I feel so free. And that's just really comforting to me. Being able to explore unique terrain and nature allows you to just practice mindfulness and being really present. It also offers opportunities for healing and just self-love, eating alone, being mindful and aware of all your senses, just noticing the smells around you, the food you're tasting, just the different flavors that maybe you don't typically experience back at home. Just it's it's just really good for mindfulness for me. And it also forces you to go out of your comfort zone and adapt. So, and sometimes I know for me, it can be just from figuring out how to get a cup of coffee to my liking in a different country. I like I have to have my cup of coffee in the morning. I'm very serious about that, like a lot of people. And you know, when you're in another country, you you don't have your ingredients, everyone has the way that they like to make their own coffee or tea, right? So it's as silly as this example might sound, it kind of forces me to like adapt to the culture. Okay, how do they drink coffee here? And what can I find that's sort of similar to how I like to drink it? That's something I I embrace. And also, you know, I mean, just learning to speak a different language. I think at the very least, you usually need to learn how to say hello and thank you. And I think that that's just definitely something that gets you out of your comfort zone and um forces you to adapt just a little bit to your surroundings. And I also think, you know, solo travel helps me with growth because well, I think as I age, I get I say as I age, I'm 38, but as I'm getting older, you know, entering 40s soon, I worry that the parts of myself that were really easy and exciting when I was, you know, in my 20s are starting to dissipate. So traveling alone kind of reminds me that my my curiosity and my sense of adventure is still very much a part of my soul and and my purpose. Um, it's okay to let some things go. As you get older, there are some things I just I'm like, I don't I don't need to do that anymore. I've proven to myself I can do it. We're good. But traveling alone is something I really don't want to let go of. And the more time that goes on where I don't do that, getting back into it, I find myself getting nervous again. So I like to kind of keep it regular, to just kind of, you know, keep reminding myself that, or just keep staying in touch with that part of myself that just really needs adventure and remind myself that hey, that's not going anywhere. That's that's me, right? I think that there's a big theme of connection when it comes to traveling alone. It offers opportunities for connection as far as maybe connecting with other people. I think it's really cool how even when you don't speak the same language as someone, there's just some universal things that happen where everyone just stops and shows appreciation. Like I went to Paris, I did the whole, you know, watched sunset on the Eiffel Tower. And everyone, you know, I've seen so many people clap when the sun sets when I've traveled to other countries. And I just I think that's beautiful. None of us speak the same language here, but we're all we can agree that this is a beautiful moment worth celebrating. And you know, when you see like a whale or like an animal that's unique that you don't see every day, you see everyone stopping in awe and appreciating the beauty. And I just think it's really cool, especially now when everyone is so divided, it's just really cool to see. Oh wow, me and this stranger over here and all these strangers around me, we can like appreciate something and connect for just this moment. I think it can also, solo travel can also help you deepen your connection with yourself. Many times we, and especially, you know, I, I'll speak for myself here, I feel really misunderstood. I'm really neurodivergent, and I think in the professional environment, sometimes, you know, it's it's it's kind of easy to get misunderstood when you have some quirks about you that aren't, you know, kind of easy to figure out. So these experiences just kind of give me an opportunity to let go of any negative critiques that I might receive from other people or that I might, you know, think about myself. It just removes this static and allows me to just see what's behind it, which is me, you know. It's it's kind of like, you know, maybe I'm not seen in this light in other areas of my life. But when I'm here, like I know I'm I know I'm strong, I know I'm brave, I know I'm a good leader, I know, you know, it just reinforces your connection to you. And I think that I also use solo travel as an opportunity to connect with loved ones that have passed on. So my parents, uh, they've both passed away and they loved to travel. I remember as a kid, we traveled quite a bit, and they I always use it as a time to just sort of deepen my my sense of gratitude and be grateful that I'm in good health and that, you know, I'm able to climb this mountain. I'm able to put my feet in this ocean. My mom lost that ability when she was my age now, and I think I like to think that she's finding joy in kind of watching me and seeing that like I'm out there really living the life that she gave me. I think that there was, I felt a lot of guilt when she was very sick. I felt very bad. Like if she can't do these things, then I felt guilty, you know, kind of living, right? And so traveling alone kind of gives me an opportunity to combat that a little bit and kind of celebrate and know that she's watching me and I know she's cheering me on, and I know that she's just so happy, right? And that just that's one way that I like to kind of experience connection when I travel alone. So all right. So you might be thinking, hang on, I have to move my foot. I'm in a very like specific position. I don't know what you're gonna hear as I try to like wiggle around right now. Okay, hopefully the chords are all still in place, nothing's gonna disconnect while I do this. Okay, got it. All right, so you might be listening and thinking, hey, guess what? Like meditation can accomplish all these things too, right? Yeah, of course. Like you don't have to travel to experience any of these things. Sure. Uh, and during my long stretches in between my trips, you know, because I have to save money and work so I can, you know, live and pay bills and prepare for the next trip. You know, I'm always thinking about how can I experience these things, this sense of freedom, this sense of connection, this sense of reflection. How can I experience that in my own backyard, right? So, and and I do that and I try my best to hold myself accountable and remember that even when I'm not traveling, hey, these things are accessible to me. I I also just believe that for me, my life purpose is very much connected to travel. So I just try to incorporate that into my life as often as possible to stay connected to my greater purpose. And maybe for some other people, that's that's not their purpose. And that's that's okay. Um, I think it's just important we don't judge each other for how we choose to explore our purpose. So now that I've talked a little bit about the emotional side of solo travel, I just want to get into some practical stuff. Because, you know, getting more confidence with this often comes from preparation. So I'm gonna share a little bit about my planning process as far as deciding where I want to go. And this isn't necessarily in any particular order, but and this is certainly not everything, right? These are just a couple things that stand out to me. I'm sure after this episode, I'm gonna think of a million other things that I wish I had remembered to share. But so first is, you know, kind of figuring out, is there a particular region that is calling me? You know, where do I feel called to go? Is there a certain part of the world? And then kind of looking up, okay, well, what is the best time of year to go there? What location works with certain months of the year? Then kind of looking at, okay, at my job, like, is that a month I can realistically take, you know, a week or two off? But I think just starting with what's what's really calling me lately. Asia has been calling me. I just feel like, you know, living in South Korea, it just really opened up this like love affair for me, and I'm just just continuing to explore that. So, and you know, just again looking at what months is it maybe less rainy, maybe I want to go during, you know, shoulder seasons, cherry blossoms, you know, leaves, foliage, etc. I also asked myself, what do I need from this trip? Do I need the beach? Do I need city? Do I need hiking and adventure? Do I need more relaxation time? Right? That's huge. And I think like when I went to when I did a little Europe trip, I was like, okay, I'm gonna focus on some major cities, right? And then when I did, I had a month off when I lived in Korea, and I said, okay, I'm gonna explore other parts of Asia, but I've really been missing the beach, so I'm gonna make this a very like beach oriented journey. So, you know, just listening to to your body and what does it need. Also look at what locations are relatively safe for solo travel. Oh, that's Important. And what kind of accommodation do I need? I'll I'll tell you this the further I travel, the more comfortable it needs to be. When I'm in the group, I can go camping, I can, you know, be a little grungier, everyone's on budget, and you know, it's just that's that's fine. When I travel alone, I'm a little more anxious, I'm a little more nervous, and that's okay. And even with all the preparation, right? And if I'm traveling for like a day and a half to get somewhere, the worst feeling is going into a hotel room and feeling like this this is gross. And maybe this makes me sound bougie or whatever, but I'm just I'm just being honest. So, you know, I think that that's important to just be really honest with yourself. I put a lot of research into where I stay, and I kind of look at, okay, where can I, you know, maybe and maybe the first place I stay at, I want to make sure it's nice because I just want to get in. I want to be as comfortable as possible after a long day or days of traveling. Then maybe during the rest of the trip, if I bop around, I can, you know, stay in like some more inexpensive places, right? Also think about am I okay with staying in multiple hotels? Like what kind of energy do I have right now? Is this the kind of trip where I'm like, hey, I want to stay in one place and do a bunch of day trips, or is this a trip where I can go to maybe a region that's a little bit bigger because I have the energy to bop around and stay in multiple hotels? I also recently learned from this past trip, it's worth asking myself, you know, looking at car sickness, because apparently I guess I'm just starting to get a little car sickness. You know, woo, late 30s, it's just all coming out. But but yeah, so you know, how how am I traveling? What kind of energy am I bringing to the table? Just being honest with where you're at. I, this should really be like first on my list if I were to go in order here, but I look at cleanliness. I am a bit of a neat freak, a bit of a germaphobe. When I travel alone, I do prefer, you know, cleaner cities and hotels. So I don't like using public restrooms, like ever, wherever I am. So I just I'm like, okay, I'm going somewhere alone. I'm already a little bit more anxious than if I was going with like a whole group. I'm gonna try to set myself up for success here. So I'm I'm gonna look for some things that could help me feel a little more comfortable. I also, and of course, you know, budget. What am I willing to let go of and what's a non-negotiable? So I can afford to maybe have some nicer things on this trip, but I can't afford to have everything, right? Still have yet to fly first class as a grown-up, right? Like it's, you know, I and I know like I'm sure I would show up places feeling so much more refreshed and just so much better rested. And if you have that, like, do it for sure. I don't, I don't, I can't do all the things. So I'm gonna put that money aside and put that more towards staying in like a comfortable like lodging situation, right? So kind of figuring out like what's what's like a hard line and where can I, you know, just kind of what am I willing to let go of, right? And I also look at health concerns, like what are some things I've maybe been dealing with in the past year, you know, and I look at the places I want to travel, like where would I go if I had some kind of medical emergency? Um, would I be able to get care that I needed in this place, or maybe I should wait until I have some different things going on to go to this place. Also, get travel medical insurance. Always. Always, always, always. I use Amex because you can kind of like pick your own. You don't have to get all the things, but if you just want the medical insurance, you can. And it's you just kind of pick the things that you want and it's it's easy. And I also talked to my doctors before I go about what shots do I need. So don't fall asleep on that. That's probably why I got sick so much when I went to Nicaragua. I'm sure, I'm certain that is why I got sick so much. But that was in my early 20s. So you you learn, right? And so yeah, talk to your doctors about shots. I also will have my doctors have been kind enough to prescribe me some antibiotics, usually as like a precaution. Because if there's, I have I'm very clean, I have excellent hygiene, but like if there's an infection to get, I will get it. It just is the card I was dealt in life. So I'll talk to my doctors and and they'll be like, hey, here's some antibiotics just in case you get this, or if this happens. And I go in fully prepared. I don't play when it comes to getting sick or taking care of my health on these trips. So I want to talk a little bit about building an itinerary. I know Google and Chat GPT can do it for you, but here's just a couple of things that I like that have been helpful to me, just some really simple ones. So I usually will start, it's really overwhelming to plan a trip. I usually will start just one day at a time. And I'll do one, I'll take one day like to do each day. So instead of being like, okay, tonight when I get home from work, I'm gonna plan the whole trip. Guess what? You can't do that. I'll be like, okay, after work, like I'll start to plan day one. I'll look at, you know, how do I get to the hotel from the airport? What kind of what's the currency? How much cash should I take out from the ATM at the airport? How do I get to the, you know, the like all the logistics, I start there. I literally just kind of play the tape as if I'm there. And then if I'm traveling far, I like to have at least one day to adjust to the time difference. So I make the first day usually kind of light. I do prioritize the must-do items towards the beginning of the trip. So that way if you if you have to cancel something or something gets moved or something gets canceled on you, or if you get sick, you have to change something, at least you can figure that out early on in the trip instead of putting something that you really wanted to do on the last day, and then something happens and you miss it, right? If possible, I think trying to plug in if you're having like a more adventure-style kind of trip, I would try to plug in at least two like half days of relaxation. So if you're moving around a lot, at least, you know, are there a few hours here and there where you can just if your hotel is a pool, can you just sit by the pool and read a book, right? Do something like that. Try to incorporate, you know, some of those like easier, cosier parts of self-care into it. And I always include emergency numbers on my itinerary. How do I call 911 in another country? How do I, what you know, the US embassy information. There's actually a website. Uh, if you Google like STEP Smart Travelers Enrollment Program, I think, you can like you can in you can put in your travel information. So then your information, I think it goes like to the embassy, so there's just some record of you, right? And where you're going. I also I like to be, I like people to know where I am. I will connect people, I will share locations with people on my Find My App. Shout out to my cousin Melissa, who I just did my last episode with. She knows where I am at all times, and I will never change that. So I have multiple friends. My partner is on there. I also carry an air tag in my luggage. I carry an air tag in my pocket and I have it connected to my partner's phone. So I do that at home. Like when I go on runs, I'll do that just in case, you know, something happens and you don't have your phone on you or it gets lost or whatever. I do that when I travel and I'll kind of let him know, hey, I'm you know, I'm going here, it's a little late. I just want you to know, you know, I got my ear tag on me. So those are some things I do. And also, I um I get really overwhelmed with just how much information is out there when I plan a trip. So sometimes what I'll do is I'll try to make use of my long car rides to work. I'll put on some YouTube videos, and that's where I'll spend time kind of just listening to what are some common mistakes that tourists make in this country, or what are some things that are illegal that most tourists don't know, and or I'll listen to YouTube videos while I'm running. And that's how I kind of will get that information because it's really hard. Like building the itinerary alone takes so much work, and then trying to find time to just get all these little like nuggets of information. It's it's hard. It's a lot of time, it's a lot of time. And then if you're if you're nervous to do any of this, I would recommend just start with something domestic and work your way up. You don't have to go around the world by yourself, you don't have to do any of this by yourself. I think it's it's great for self-growth. And for some people, it's not their thing, and that's fine. I would at least recommend every now and then maybe just do a weekend trip or a day trip on your own, you know, as long as it, even if it's just an hour away, as long as it just gets you out of your environment, that's that's the goal. So in closing, I think that solo travel has has really taught me that self-care isn't always about immediate comfort. Sometimes it's about just proving to yourself that you can trust your own company, that you are resilient, and you know, to trust your own ability to build a meaningful life. So that's what I got. Those are some things I just wanted to share after after this trip. So so thank you. Thank you for for joining me and for listening to my story. I definitely plan on doing more about solo travel because it's something I'm so passionate about. And I definitely have a couple of ideas about people, other people I want to bring into those conversations. But I'm excited to continue that. So more on that to come. But feel free to send me a message on Instagram. I'm at stories and self care, or you can email me at storiesandself care at gmail.com. So thanks so much. I hope you enjoy the rest of your day. Take care, and I'll see you next time.