Travel Brave: 5 Reasons Travel is Essential Now More Than Ever Before
In 2016, with so much to seemingly be afraid of, travel-anxiety is growing — but that doesn’t mean you should throw away your passports just yet!
In an age of growing concerns over terrorism, abroad and on home turf, travel cannot be abandoned — it needs to be embraced. While it may be luxury, it doesn’t mean that travel is not a necessity. Here are five reasons why the nomads of the world should stay mobile:
One: To Crush a Culture of Fear
Imagine if we responded to every potential threat by just, you know, avoiding it. Look around you right now, and see if there are any things that could potentially put your life in mortal peril. What about round your home? Outside your door? In the city?
See, as it turns out, pretty much everything can kill you, but danger is something human beings have evolved to assess and accommodate — it’s not something that keeps us from living our lives to the fullest.
A culture of fear is a climate in which fear is incited in citizens for political, social, or economical gain. Think about the American election cycle — some candidates have run entire campaigns instigating a feeling of fear because it helps with their chances of leadership. Corporations make billions of dollars annually inspiring fear in consumers because it lines their pockets.
“Over time, many interlocking aspects of our society have become increasingly sophisticated at communicating messages and information that produce fear responses. Advertising, political ads, news coverage and social media all send the constant message that people should be afraid — very afraid.”
The media will have you believe that the world is a dangerous place, and it is, but it always has been — there’s nothing new there.
Travel is the best way to truth-seek and lose fear — it’s a lot more difficult to believe what you see on the news when it directly contradicts what you have seen in the world. After all, the world you see on a screen depicts a far more dangerous reality than the world you can see when you live it.
Two: To Embrace a Culture of Curiosity
Fear tells us to look away, but curiosity tells us to look deeper within. As children, no stone was unturned, no leaf unexamined, no path left unadventured, but as adults we allow our curiosity to run away with our relentless energy, and it leaves us susceptible to boredom. It makes our worlds seem smaller, and it makes the awe-inspiring feel average.
Embracing a culture of curiosity is about seeing the world you inhabit, not the part you know, or even the part you recognize, but adventuring out and exploring new terrain, making new friends, seeing new sunsets, and drinking a whole lot of new wine.
It’s about travelling so far, you end up meeting yourself: While we explore, we will discover, and while we discover, we will grow.
In his book “10 Keys To Unlock Your Innovative Self,” Stephen Di Biase writes:
“Children begin innocently challenging what their parents prefer to gloss over. Their curiosity forces us to see the world afresh and challenges our adult assumptions. Recapturing your childlike curiosity is essential if you want to become a more innovative person.”
In 2016, we’re inundated with information from the moment we wake up til the moment we go to sleep, it’s crucial to challenge what you’re told and challenge what you know. By embracing curiosity through travelling, you’re faced with new perspectives that allow you to see the world afresh. And in today’s society, we need innovators more than ever.
When writing to a friend, Albert Einstein wrote: “People like you and me never grow old … We never cease to stand like curious children before the great mystery into which we were born.”Innovators like Einstein were the way they were because they saw the world and all of its experiences as their own playground.
Well, if it’s good enough for Einstein…
Three: To Break down Barriers
Travel is, and always was, a unifying force. In a world that needs peace, travel is the phenomenon that will bring it. The most efficient way to combat terrorism and its aims is to travel, learn, and grow. As Mark Twain said:
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.”
Living in a progressively globalized world, we’re more connected than ever, and we have more access to other cultures and communities than ever. Connecting with the citizens of the world is integral to understanding, tolerance, and community.
In his Ted Talk, “For Tolerance, We Need More… Tourism?” Aziz Abu Sarah notes: “We have a wall of hatred and ignorance that separates us … Tourism is the best and most sustainable way to bring down those walls, and to create a sustainable way of connecting with each other.”
The closer you get to people from thousands of miles away, the smaller the distance becomes between you and them — closing cultural gaps is essential in a world that is at risk of becoming divided. Breaking down barriers is important on a global level, but as a personal journey, it is enriching, uplifting, and unifying.
In a globalized world, the only way to move forward successfully is to build bridges and not walls. Why allow our differences to separate us, when we can allow our similarities to unite?
Four: For the Travel Economy
From independent wineries, to tour guides, to local hotels, to small restaurants, the tourism industry isn’t comprised solely of large corporate chains. Many small and local businesses rely on a thriving tourism industry in their community, so that they can survive.
The money spent by tourists, not just on tourism, but on the entire spectrum of necessities a traveler needs on vacation (think: food, transport, clothing etc), injects a great deal of money into local economies. For economies that rely on the tourism trade, terrorism that fuels travel-anxiety can have a hugely detrimental impact on their sustainability.
The estimated $8.2 billion dollars that was removed from the economy thanks to cancellations from apprehensive travellers last year, isn’t 8.2 billion dollars taken from the pockets of airline bosses and hotel-chain managers, it’s absence is noticed most starkly from independently run businesses who rely on every cent.
And it isn’t just tourists spending the money, for local businesses specifically, any income they see is later injected back into the local economy — which means tourism brings money to local communities and is then spent right in those local communities. Tourism revenues are sometimes referred to as having a multiplier effect — a higher proportion of every tourist dollar earned is consistently reintroduced back into the local economy.
“Ultimately, the more tourist dollars coming in, the larger the economic benefit for everyone.” Udemy
And sure, local economies may not seem like your problem now, but they very well could be moving forward.
Tourism is undoubtedly a source of pride in local communities — it shapes the cultural identity of a region, as it allows locations to promote and revel in their history and heritage. While a destination continues to be popular, tourism helps aid in the preservation of the history and culture of a region that otherwise may not manage to be maintained.
Tourism is responsible for saving many local heritage sites from destruction and ensures the survival of local communities — without the tourist trade, regions become at risk, and their legacy may not survive.
Turns out, you need travel, as much as travel needs you.
Five: It’s a Beautiful World, After All
Okay, so admittedly this one isn’t specific to 2016, but it is important to remember this now, more than ever. In the face of disaster, it can be difficult to move forward optimistically, and it can be difficult to see the beauty in darkness.
“We live in a world that is full of beauty, charm, and adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have, so long as we seek them with eyes open.” Jawaharlal Nehru
Sometimes, it’s easy to get wrapped up in what you know and scared of what you don’t. However, it’s important to ignore what you know and get wrapped up in what you don’t.
