We travel out of curiosity, to make our dreams come true, to unwind or because we have to. We may be attracted by art and cosmopolitan cities, or by hot deserts and wet jungles. Maybe we chase our dream destinations or we start dreaming once we set foot on a new land. This is why I talk about Travel Psychology.

While imaging the next trip, we get quickly invaded by a cauldron of emotions, body and soul. Few steps on new streets, paths, beaches and mountains, are enough to feel reinvigorated, despite our diffidence toward the unknown, the fatigue and the few hours of sleep or the lightheartedness slowly lost on our way home. Once there, all those experiences, come back home with us. In fact, living inside our memories, they will echoe every time we will see a picture, smell a perfume, taste a flavour, listen to a sound or a specific word. 

After a journey, we get back home, same but different. 

Every journey, far away or nearby, simple or adventurous, relaxing or exhausting, is not just an experience to add to our memories suitcase. It is an opportunity to get to know and get in touch with ourselves.

Travel psychology: the stages of a journey

A journey is a set of tangible and objective stages, but felt as experiential and subjective. Every step, if faced with consciousness, is an opportunitity to grow, reinvent and get to know oneself.

Departure

To leave for a journey means to temporarily stop our reassuring daily routine in order to meet a new, unexplored reality. We choose to get rid of our solid certainties and to get expose to our insecurities, emerging before a trip. Therefore, euphoria and anxiety alternate during every preparatory step, from the planning to the packing, from the hotels to the travel companions. The most apprehensive sides of us start emerging, making us doubt everything and feel unsure toward the unknown, until the engine starts. 

The departure has a strong psychological relevance, but there is more. In fact, also the destination we choose has an inner value. We travel to get distracted from our daily life, to discover new cultures, to realize our dreams, to find answers, to nourish our vitality or to fulfill a need. To sum up, the destination depends on our personal characteristics, on the real or idealistic image of ourselves, on our believes, on what we need, on the expectations we have and, finally, on our motivation.

Itinerary

Once arrived, an engaging path starts. It is a path made of stopovers, borders, barriers and goals, physical as well as mental, emotional and social.

Traveling teaches us to question ourselves, our ideas, our behaviours and feelings. At every step, our expectations come into play. Depending on them, we will feel satisfy or disgusted. Every kilometer will bring us wonder, worry, joy, anger, melancholy and serenity, shaking our soul and body in order to welcome the new World. Let’s get involved into this mental and emotional turmoil, where “different” means familiar, where all those believes we started the journey with, get shattered inside us, where all our initial insecurities adapt to new shapes.  

We observe never seen landscapes. We dive into distant cultures. We discover new ways of living and interacting. We listen to dissonant and harmonious words. And we sit next to unknown people, our future travel companions.

Every moment turns into an opportunity to open ourselves to the journey, welcoming at open arms, heart and mind what extraordinary and cheerful the World offers us.

Back home

We set foot in our initial comfort zone and we get back again to our work and social-related routine. Yet, after a journey, even at our own place, we discover ourselves different from when we left. 

In fact, the places we walked on and the people we met, left a mark. The experiences we had, influenced the way we feel and act. Everything, in a journey,  get inside our mind through sensations that turn into memories. And here it comes, nostalgia, this warm feeling we soften through a picture, a trinket from the World, the decision of eating at a particular restaurant or of telling an anecdote to our friends. When we get back home from a journey, we are different, because everything we experienced becomes part of our daily life, changing it. 

And this is the greatest present we gave ourselves: reinventing ourselves.

Light

My travel Psychology

I truly believe in the teaching of traveling, an intensive course where we can explore ourselves while discovering the World we live in. Traveling allows to analyze experiences and process moods that obstruct our daily life, to bring out resources we struggle to see, to discover sides of ourselves slumbered in our habits.

Yet, if it is true that a journey has a psychological essence and a therapeutic value, it cannot work by itself. A journey is not the cure, but a noble way to get in contact with ourselves questioning, dealing with our own precariety, observing ourselves with consciousness, discovering with wonder, taking care of ourselves with compassion and reinventing through new desires.  

So, let’s discover Travel Psychology with me. And now, 

Where shall we go next?

Travel Psych: read more

Beerli, A., Meneses, G. D., & Gil, S. M. (2007). Self-congruity and destination choice. Annals of Tourism Research, 34(3), 571-587.

Carbonetto, M. G. (2007). Il viaggio, metafora della vita. Turismo e Psicologia, (1).

Magris, C. (2008). Journeying, Yale University Press.

Terzani, T. (2006). La fine è il mio inizio. Un padre racconta al figlio il grande viaggio della vita. Longanesi.

Chiara Travel Psych

Una psicologa con la valigia sempre in mano.
Benvenuti nel blog di Psicologia del viaggio.

www.travelpsych.world