“Our Nature lies in movement; complete calm is death.” Blaise Pascal
We can all name the great travelers: Magellan, Lewis & Clark, Christopher Columbus, Marco Polo. Some of the greatest travelers who have ever lived did it before technology made it easy. They traveled to explore new lands and make discoveries for themselves and their countries. Nowadays it seems like nearly every inch of the world has been mapped, but many people still feel a call to travel to remote places, dangerous peaks, or tourist destinations. Why has traveling endured as a fascination, hobby, passion, even a way of life for some people?
The first and most obvious reason is for the fun of it- people seek new adventures and experiences. It is one thing to see pictures and read about the beauty and artistic precision of the ceiling in the Sistine Chapel, but it is an entirely different thing to see it in person. Looking up you cannot help but gawk at the art that man is capable of creating. Or driving through the canyons in Utah you cannot help but stare in similar amazement at the beauty of nature. Traveling is the best way to expand horizons. The great American author Mark Twain traveled across the United States, Europe, and the Middle East in his lifetime. He put it best when he said, “travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness.” Only through seeing different cultures first hand is it possible to understand what that culture and its people are all about. Travel is also how we can see that, as American poet Maya Angelou said, “all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die.” Leaving your comfort zone to enter a place that might seem completely foreign is daunting on many levels. However, there is a level of comfort that is found in knowing that no matter where you are from, everyone has the same basic desires and emotions.
Another reason that people often pack up and take off is restlessness, or as Jon Krakauer describes it in Into the Wild, an “agitation of the soul.” This is an idea that is often coupled with young people- young adults who go out “roughing it” and feel the need to push their limits so that they can find themselves or come to some better understanding of who they are. This motivation certainly is not limited to younger people- after a life changing a lot of people travel to come to terms with their life (Eat, Pray, Love perhaps?). This idea of traveling to find oneself is central to Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer. It is the story of Christopher McCandless, a successful college graduate who takes off for the Alaskan wilderness where he survives by his own means for nearly four months before dying after eating a poisonous seed. Summed up like that his story seems rather grim, but it is a fantastic story about one unique and interesting person’s journey. Margaret Mead, an American anthropologist, also captures this idea of self-discovery through travel. “As the traveler who has once been from home is wiser than he who has never left his own doorstep, so a knowledge of one other culture should sharpen our ability to scrutinize more steadily, to appreciate lovingly, our own.” Perhaps one of the best things about traveling is that it allows us to appreciate home that much more.
The last need for travel is a call to service. Nicholas Kristof is a columnist for the New York Times who is known for reporting on crises all around the globe. From the Congo to Rwanda, Sudan, and numerous other countries, Kristof reports on the most outrageous conflicts and puts them in sight of people around the world, calling on them to do something about it. The HBO documentary film Reporter (2009) follows Kristof as he goes with a team to the Congo in the hopes of somehow capturing what life there is really like and finding a story that will move people in the United States to care about the crisis there. He completely immerses himself going entirely out of any American’s comfort zone when he enters the war-torn Congo. His risks are what allow concerned others to see a glimpse of life in another part of the world that most people cannot travel to. A huge aspect of traveling is gaining knowledge about the world around you so that you can become a better person in that world. Nicholas Kristof is one example of a person who allows others to obtain some of that knowledge.
So what else should you keep in mind before setting off on your own trip? Keep an open mind! Don’t be surprised when you experience something that shatters your expectations or any prejudices. In fact, embrace it. Let it push you back on your heels- maybe even knock you over. There is no limit to the new experiences that one can gain from getting out and seeing the world.