Why I Don't Travel Anymore and Neither Should You

It all started that one fateful day.

Someone said to me “You should travel more often.”

I fell into the trap and asked, “Why ?”

He said “It helps in ways you cannot imagine.”

I replied “Try me.” (That obnoxious me)

He said “It gives you perspective about life.”

I said “I already have mine, it says you need money.”

He said “You idiot, just do as I say for once.”

Being a nice guy that I have always been, I said ok.

And it was the biggest mistake of my life. It became a habit. An addiction.
To travel, to meet people, to soak in the beauty of nature, to feel awed by the stories of people.

Unable to control my urges and falling deep into the quest of happy realization, I packed my bag and just left.

I left behind all the comforts for those hilly terrains, my laptop and iPad for those scenic views, honking of cars for those silent sounds of streams and people for those human beings.

How crazy of me !

I mean who does that?

Who leaves behind everything you’ve toiled so hard for things that are free.

FREE !

It feels so bewildering that those things were free. What about our concept of money, luxury?
Where does all this fit in?

The ordeal wasn’t over yet.

I stayed with a family who was staying on a mountain.
Yes, literally a mountain.

There weren’t many homes (not houses) there because, remember, limited internet connection, no pubs/discs, no super markets nearby, but I just couldn’t stop frowning while looking at them.
I was looking at them, a family of 5, with utter disbelief and a hint of jealousy.

They were happy!

For all my wits I couldn’t understand why. They had minimal facilities, and no fancy stuff in their home but still, they were happy.

I couldn’t help but ask why and how and why and some more why.

All I could understand at that point of time was that the family I was staying with is losing out on some really cool stuff and great fun that we city people have. 

And as we looked out of the small wooden paneled window of his home (such a cliché, but true), he and his wife along with their kids who were around the ages of 14-19, told me a very simple thing, “we understood the meaning of life earlier than everybody around us and then decided to move here 10 years back.”

Now you should always know the kind of people you’re going to spend the night with and after that statement of his, I feared for my life.

They were not the locales.

But anyway, I survived and that’s why you’re reading this.

She told me (she was a big shot in the marketing world and an old trunk of stuff proved that), and this is super cute, “We met while we were only graduate and were about to go for our post graduation. We had these dreams of making big into the world, together. We wanted to have a palatial house, two cars, club membership and etc etc.”

He interjected “She was always very focussed and keen on making a career. And that kind of gave me a push as well.”

“We both went to top B-schools and shortly after passing started to work and started realizing our dreams were too naive. We confused money with happiness.”

“We were both working so did not have any time for each other. When I could get leaves, she had to go somewhere and when she managed something, I was busy. It started taking a toll on our relationship. We met less and fought more.”

I was listening intently and felt like, so what.

You need to make sacrifices if you want money.

They were weird.

“We had to make sacrifices which were not worth it.”

Spooky, right!

“So we sat together and did something which is very unusual these days; we talked.”

She smiled and continued “We decided very formally to have an hour of conversation, only an hour because we both had meeting that day.”

“Fortuitously, our kids were also at home that day.”

“They were busy, though, in their phones.We saw them. We all were in the same room and nobody was talking to each other.”

“We looked at each other and knew what we had to do.”

I was looking at them. I didn’t know what to say.

“We decided to make a choice.”

“I asked her to continue with her work and said I’d be happy to give up on my career.”

I looked at him with a smile that cannot be explained here.

“And I said, you don’t have to.”

I asked, “Then how did you guys end up here.”

“We took a month off from our jobs and decided to travel together without making any concrete plans about where to go.”

So much for being an MBA, I thought. And they were two.

“We found the happiness here, away from everything that we had built for ourselves in the city.”

 I asked “So you don’t miss what you had.”

“Of course we do sometimes. But it’s about the choices.”

“We decided what was important for us at that point of time.”

“She was the most important thing in my life. Our kids were the most important thing in our lives.”

I couldn’t stop being a jerk, “What about your kids? Do they like here? Don’t you think you’re ruining their lives here in the wild?”

“We love it here”.

In my stupid face.

“And it’s not a trade off that we need to choose either education or living here. We study in the city but whenever we get time, we come here. We do go to other places as well but the is where it all makes sense.This place reminds us about what is important in life. Our parents made a choice and despite a few difficulties, they have been happy and we have been happy.

“The most important thing in life is happiness and we find that in each other.”

It was getting a bit heavy for me.

“We know it sounds very philosophical and poetic.”

They could read my mind!

“But in the end, this is what matters and thankfully we didn’t spend 50 years of our lives in misery only to realize all this which we already know now.”

Now it struck me.

Am I going to feel miserable after sometime?

It is great right now and I’m enjoying the money I am earning.

Is it transient? Is this money=happiness not going to last forever?

“It’s ok if you’re confused right now. You are not supposed to get all the answers right now”, she said.

I looked at her with some kind of hope.

“It took us a crisis to reach here and had it not been for that, we might not have come here at all.”

The hope.

“You need to understand the power of crisis and failures. When we’re comfortable in our lives, we will not shake up the status quo. Unfortunately, that’s how human beings are.”

He said, in an assuring tone,” You’d reach there. The only thing is that do not be blinded by transient happiness. And find a smile in small things. Share a smile when you see an infant playing, a flower blossoming, and when you see marvels of nature. These things will keep you on course.”

I was thinking now.

It was not that I was happy; I was ignoring the fact that I wasn’t happy. I did not want the things I had. I was surrounding myself with things so that I do not hear myself.
I was keeping busy in the office, then friends, then TV series, then going out on weekends (what does that even mean anyway), and why was I doing all this, so that I do not ask myself the tough questions.

I was feeling a certain peace. I wasn’t feeling uneasy or on the edge as I used to when I was in the comforts of my city. 

As I looked out of the window and basked in the beauty of snow covered mountains, I knew that I wasn’t lost anymore. I wasn’t afraid to ask myself what I wanted. I wasn’t afraid of failing anymore.

It was the feeling of liberation.

The freedom.

P.S: I do not have started on my journey but at least now, I know where to go.

Happy Experiences. To Many More.