Why I Am Traveling

Last Monday, I took the train down from San Francisco to Los Angeles on the famed Amtrak Coast Starlight route.

The trip took 12 hours total--a temporal investment that could have taken me to New Zealand by air. The experience was, I'm sure, a mere shell of what it once was; the cars smelled like green bean casserole reheated one too many times, and the staff was unresponsive and sometimes outright rude. My travel mates were mostly white-haired retirees, leisurely sipping their cocktails, reading their newspapers, and nibbling on their roast beef dinners in the dining car. The train stopped often and seemingly without reason.

So why take the train? To stretch out the distance from A to B. I snuck up to the lounge car early in the trip, with its floor to ceiling windows and outward-facing seats, and set up camp with my books and my Moleskin. There, I watched the scenery change from backwater city suburbs to green and yellow pastoral scenes to sweeping Pacific vistas. Rolling down the spine of California in a self-contained glass tube gave me the space and time I needed to just be. Nothing to do, nowhere to be... just ride.

My reasons for traveling through India and Southeast Asia next year aren’t much different, but I've struggled to find the right words. When asked, I shy away from answering outright, hiding behind vague explanations or deflecting jokes. My questioners tend to react in one of two ways: oversimplified envy or skeptical confusion. The former group has romanticized views about what long-term travel entails, noncommittal dreams about doing it themselves one day, or regrets about not having gone when they were my age. “Good for you!” they say, patting my back heartily. “You’re going to have such an amazing experience!”

The latter group grills me about logistics and the long view: “What are you going to do for healthcare?”, “How will you make money?” or--my favorite--“What do you plan to do when you come back?” They want to know how this trip will fit onto my resume, build on my prior achievements and contribute to my future career. Behind their eyes, I see the real questions flash: What are you running away from? Are you one of those going off to “find themselves”? Good luck.

I know these questions all too well. They kept me from quitting my job months before I should have. They still wake me up in the middle of the night from time to time.

The truth is, I don't have all the answers, but I do have real and tangible reasons for trying to do what I'm trying to do.  I shy away from answering honestly and openly because I'm afraid of sounding like a cliché or being misunderstood. I'm nervous that I'll write checks with my mouth that I can't cash, or worse--return to California in three months with my tail between my legs.

If posting this blog has taught me anything, though, it's that being vocal and honest about your intentions and expressing them to the people that will hold you accountable can be the difference between a false-start and a real undertaking. So, without any disclaimers or deflection, let me for once answer the damn question: Why am I traveling?

In short, I’m traveling for space and time. Space and time to:

1. Reflect. My life to this point has been driven in large part by action for action’s sake, chasing the next award, grade, trophy, diploma or promotion. I want to stop the hamster wheel for a while and do something without any extrinsic rewards, reconnecting to the ‘why’ behind the 'what'.

2. Struggle a bit. At Google, my every possible need was taken care of and attended to. Though it might sound crazy, I know I quit in part just to feel challenged again, to be forced to figure my own shit out. Don't worry--I've already had all the romance sucked out of this idea for me by having to navigate the healthcare marketplace and figure out how to get my unemployed ass health insured in the US and abroad next year. It’s not pretty, but it’s a new challenge, and I’m learning a lot about different types of health coverage and how they work (Post on travel logistics & prep to come). I’m traveling, in part, to put myself in places and situations like these where I have to face new challenges, develop new skills, and reemerge more complex than I was before (See post: “Post-Fear”). This includes having to figure out what the hell I'm going to do with myself when I come back.

3. Be alone. I spent quite a bit of time alone abroad in my father’s homeland of Denmark growing up. From an early age, I had to learn how to cope with homesickness and language isolation on my own, rely on myself for comfort and inspiration, and test my boundaries now and then to meet new people and do new things. It helped me cultivate peace and enjoyment in solitude, seeking out the company of others only when it fostered growth. In the past several years, I’ve let life in the fast lane pressure me into believing that being alone is sad and pathetic. I want to rediscover the peace and joy in solitude I’ve felt in the past.

4. Study mind-body connect disciplines. I have loose plans to study yoga in an ashram in India, meditation in a Buddhist temple in Thailand, Tai Chi with a master in China, and possibly some others. I would love it if I could eventually find a way to use this knowledge to help move us away from the abstract materialist view of health we have here in the West towards one that acknowledges and honors the mind-body connection. That’s about as specific as I can get on the “career plan” front.

5. Read. I’d love to continue digging into some of the great spiritual texts (Bhagavad Gita, Bible, Tibetan Book of the Dead, etc) in the way that only wandering allows. I also want to dive into some of the individual works of the saints, heroes, sages, artists, poets and madmen that I so admire: men and women throughout history who went against the grain and claimed their own truth (this entails a reading list too long to include here).

All of this is subject to change as I keep adjusting to the present moment on the road, staying open to unknown possibilities (See post: “Always Something Else”). I don’t know if I’ll be back in 6 months, a year, or more. But at least for now, these are my reasons.