Everyone has heard a story about how the travel cure has made someone’s life better, whether it be a physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual improvement.
Travel is an amazing force because of the opportunities it affords to learn about new places, experience new things and meet new people.
However, travel can also be a tremendous force for healing.
In fact, strapping on a backpack and heading down the open road can be so powerful that I’ve come to call it the Travel Cure.
Everyone has heard a story about how the travel cure has made someone’s life better on some level, whether it be a physical, mental, emotional or spiritual improvement.
Recently, a friend told me about her stepfather who had experienced this phenomenon. Several years ago, he learned he had a degenerative, incurable heart disease, and one year to live.
He and his wife made the decision to sell everything, including their house, and spend his last year backpacking through the parched deserts of India to the towering domes of Russia.
Those who have had a transformative journey of their own know how this story ends: the untold benefits of traveling allowed him a new lease on life.
Without the stress of a demanding job and the day-to-day grind, his health improved to the point that he continues to live a normal, active life. His only worry now is looking for somewhere permanent to live.
Escaping Despair
My own experience of the Travel Cure was much less dramatic, but still testament to how travel can help save our lives.
After a series of events, including reverse culture shock and the death of a close friend, I was plunged into a deep hole of despair.
Soon enough, I was reaching for my backpack, ready for another adventure. This time, however, I wanted it to be more focused. I wanted to try what writer Elizabeth Gilbert terms ‘the physics of a quest.’ According to Gilbert,
“If you really are prepared to see anything that happens to you as an expression of truth that has been offered up for your own benefit and learning – then revelation will not be withheld from you. You will be shown who you are and what it all means.”
Open to expressions of truth, I headed for the gilded Buddha statues and dripping jungles of Thailand.
Finding Purpose
I had no solid travel plans. There was no itinerary, and no one to meet. My only guidebook was Joseph Campbell’s iconic Hero with a Thousand Faces.
I answered the call to adventure by landing in Bangkok in the middle of a dark warm night. On a whim, I headed south to the islands and beaches that have filled so many travel brochures.
One dusky evening, as I lay sleepily on my hotel bed channel surfing, something on the television caught my eye. A documentary came on about a village in Thailand created by a German-Thai couple for children infected with HIV/AIDS.
I was moved to tears as I watched the jolly former-CEO and his petite Thai wife’s venture of creating foster-style homes for these children who had been orphaned or abandoned because of their infection.
As soon as the sun rose, I contacted the German.
Lighting Candles
We arranged to meet in Bangkok, where he lived. He then drove me two hours north to the verdant, snake-riddled rural heartland of Thailand where the village was located.
I spent two days with the children, who were, for the most part, flourishing against the odds. I felt humbled, imbued with a new found sense of hope, and remembered the Chinese proverb, “It is better to light a single candle than bemoan the darkness.”
Having witnessed how precious and precarious life can be, and how these children embraced each moment, I closed my eyes, counted my many, many blessings and pledged to be optimistic and live in the present, no matter what.
At the village I met an Australian woman who ‘happened’ to be passing through and who had just published her autobiography, much of which centered on her work as a modern day Mother Teresa in Thailand’s most notorious prison, ironically known as the Bangkok Hilton.
Despite all of the pain and suffering she has witnessed and endured, she was one of the most positive people I have ever met. “I live on faith,” she told me. “I don’t have an income, I do God’s work.”
It was another encounter that made me happy I had found the courage to step out of my geographical and psychological comfort zone.
The Healing Power Of Travel
Taking note of the signposts and following them had opened up a whole new world. My understanding of the infinite possibilities became much broader.
Meeting people who had given up lucrative corporate careers to devote themselves to others planted seeds in my own mind and inspired me to do something meaningful.
When traveling, we are given opportunities and experiences that we otherwise would have missed. When we choose to see these experiences as significant, then they are ultimately healing, and help light our path as we step into the future.
I was able to return home with a magic elixir – the new experiences gave me a new perspective.
By changing physical environments, something inside of me had also changed. Just a month earlier, before I stepped off the plane in bustling Bangkok, I had been utterly depressed. Now, I was on my travel buzz, in awe of the people I had met and the beautiful things I had seen.
I was transformed. As Japanese Buddhist priest Shinso said 1000 years ago, “No matter what road I travel, I’m going home.”
What do you think of the healing power of travel? Share your thoughts in the comments!
Tania Campbell is a freelance writer based in Seoul, South Korea. Her work as a reporter, teacher and NGO activist has taken her to all corners of the globe. Traveling has always been and continues to be her main source of inspiration and way of understanding the world, which she tries to capture in her writing.
译文:
在旅行的治疗功能下寻找信念
每个人都听说过这样的故事，旅行疗法让某个人的生活变得更美好了，无论是生理上，心智上，情绪上还是精神上的美好提升。
旅行是一种神奇的力量，因为它提供给人们了解新地方，历经新事物和揭示新朋友的机会。
但是，旅行也对于治疗也十分有利。
事实上，背着背包朝着光明大道前进的感觉是如此强大，我就开始称它为旅行疗法了。
每个人都听说过这样的故事，旅行疗法让某个人的生活变得更美好了，无论是生理上，心智上，情绪上还是精神上的美好提升。
最近，一个朋友告诉了我她继父的一些事情，他已经体验过这种疗法。几年前，他得知他患上了无法医治的晚期心脏病，并且只有一年的寿命。
他和他的妻子决定变卖所有的东西，包括他们的房子，然后在剩下的时间里在印度炎热的大沙漠和俄罗斯高耸的圆屋顶进行背包旅行。
那些经历过这些转变性旅行的人就知道这个故事的结尾：来自旅行的不可言喻的益处赋予了他继续生活的理由。
没有找工作的压力，也没有日复一日的苦差事，他的健康状况日渐好转，他也得以继续过他正常的富含活力的生活。他唯一的烦恼就是找寻一个终身寄托之所。
遁逃的绝望
我旅行疗法的经历没有这么戏剧化，但也足以证明旅行是怎样拯救我们的生活的。
在经历一系列的打击后，这其中包括扭转的文化冲击和一个亲密朋友的死讯，我彻底陷入了绝望的深渊。
很快，我重拾我的背包，准备起了下一段冒险。这一次，我想忠于旅行本身。我想尝试一下伊丽莎白·吉儿伯特所说的“探求的物理学”。据她所说：“如果你真的准备看看那些能使你受益，对你来说是真相的东西，披露本身并不能够阻止你的前进，你将会发现你的自我。”
真实面对真相，我朝着泰国镀金的佛像和青翠欲滴的丛林前进。
找寻目标
我没有固定的旅行计划。我没有旅行指南，也没有朋友可以拜访。唯一的向导手册是约瑟夫·坎贝尔的千面英雄。
在一个黑暗而温暖的夜晚，我响应了冒险的号召，来到曼谷。在一时的兴致驱使下，我向南行到那些铺天盖地出现在旅行手册里的岛屿和海岸上。
一个灰蒙蒙的晚上，我正昏昏欲睡的躺在酒店床上换台，电视上的东西吸引了我的注意力。是部关于一对德泰夫妇建的一个村落的纪录片，这个村落是为了感染了艾滋病毒的孩子们而建。
当我看着这个曾经是首席执行官的快乐男人和他娇小的泰国妻子为了孩子们建立温馨家庭的时候，我感动地落泪，他们都是孤儿，或是因为受了感染而被抛弃的孩子。
天一亮我就联系了那个德国人。
闪闪烛光
我们安排在曼谷他的住所见面。然后他驱车带我北行到了泰国的中心郊区地带，这里葱绿茂密，到处都是蛇，也是那个村落的所在地。
我和孩子们相处了两天，大多数孩子对新奇事物有着强烈的好奇心。我感受到新生的一丝希望并且想起中国谚语“与其诅咒黑暗,不如燃起蜡烛.”。
在亲眼见证了生命是多么的珍贵和脆弱，还有这些孩子是怎样珍视每一刻后，我闭上了我的眼，许了好多祝福并且发誓不管什么事情发生我都要变得乐观，好好的活在当下。
在村子里，我碰见一位“碰巧”经过此地的澳洲女士，她刚发行了自传，主要描写她曼谷最臭名昭著的监狱里作为现代版的特雷莎修女的事情，这个监狱被人们戏称为曼谷希尔顿酒店。
尽管目击了也承受了这么多的痛苦和磨难，她却是我见过的最乐观的人之一。“我靠信念生活，”她告诉我说，“我没有收入，我做的是上帝的工作啊。”
这是另外一个让我开心的际遇，我开始有勇气走出自己的环境上和心理上的舒适地带。
旅行的治愈功能
记录下每一个路标，跟着它们走……这为我打开了一个新的世界。我对无限可能的理解越来越广阔了。
遇见这么些人……他们放弃了利润满满的经营事业，全身心地去帮助别人，这件事在我心里种下了种子，激励着我去做一些有意义的事情。
旅行时，我们会碰见一些我们原本要错过的机会和际遇。当我们选择把他们看作是有意义的经历的时候，它们就会愈合，并且照亮我们走向未来的旅途。
我可以带着神奇的炼金药回家啦——新经历给了我新视角。
通过改变生理环境，我内心的某些东西也发生了改变。就在一个月前，在我在繁忙的曼谷走下飞机的时候，我还是一脸沮丧绝望。现在，我还在旅途中，对我遇见的那些人和那些美好的事情由衷的敬佩。
我被改造了。就像日佛家僧侣伊藤在1000年前所说的“不管我走那条路，我都是在回家的路上”。
你对旅行的治愈功能怎样看呢？在评论中和我们分享一下吧！
塔妮娅·坎贝尔
塔妮娅·坎贝尔是一个居住在韩国首尔的自由作家。记者，老师和无政府组织活动家的三重身份把她带到了世界的各个角落。旅行从来就是并且会一直都是她创作的灵感来源和理解世界的途径，这些她都会在她的作品力求表现。