From What and Whom are Adventure Travelers Escaping?
The line between being alone and being lonely can become really blurred when one remains on the road at an almost semi-permanent basis. Physically being in new, strange places constantly, a traveler become a "floater," a being without a group of long-known acquaintances that give one the reason to remain in that place for long time. That idea of being physically alone and friendless at times, more often than not, begin to affect one's mental state toward a sense of confusion as to whether that sense of being alone is voluntary or forced, and whether willingly accepted as a side effect of traveling.
And as the author cooked up some noodles in his one-room apartment by himself, lamenting the fact that the more-than-a-year-long adventure in the Philippines will come to an end in a week, amid the last minute arrangements for flights, visas, and apartments, he would occasionally stop and think awhile, on whether this year really changed him all that much, from a perspective outside the destructive realizations gained from working in a particular corporate environment. The results are inconclusive, so much so that he had to reflect on his sense of self a year ago in writing.
That self of exactly one year ago was too concerned with the headaches of being a newly-anointed, inexperienced manager of a fairly large contingency, trying to be philosophical about the "right" methodologies of encouraging productivity and fairness. The author of one year ago was literally too concerned with work, too overwhelmed with responsibility to feel that he had or could be multitasking enough to have a life outside those corporate responsibilities. It is a state of the mind that the unemployed self of one year later find a bit ridiculous and unfathomable.
A wise man once warned, "one cannot just keep running forward to chase a goal, without occasionally stopping to check the surroundings. Because when one feel tired and need to take a breather, one would realize that all the people he started running with disappeared, nowhere to be found in thick crowds." It is true. That author of one year ago was too focused that he forgot to pace himself, preventing a meaningful buildup of something other than work-related stress and thoughts (and occasional travel anecdotes) to entertain himself when work was done and over.
That is perhaps what the adventure traveler do not see in life and the reason that keep them constantly running toward new pastures. Excitement wears away really quickly no matter what is that thing that drew one to the place in the beginning, especially if that one thing happens to be a new job. Work is boring, no matter how exciting it sounds on paper or how it actually was when first started. That is the nature of everything in the world that has at least certain aspect of repetition in its routine. Eating the same for lunch and commuting the same roads take toll on a degrading sense of curiosity.
In essence, when on the surface, the traveler is seeking to escape from the daily routine of doing similar thing with the same people in same places, whether at work or outside work, what the traveler is actually doing is escaping from him or herself, or more precisely, that sense of inability to constantly regenerate excitement and curiosity in a situation that is bound to become more repetitive and more mundane over time. Commitment to work and the stress that came from that commitment only served to cloud the long-term vision to address that need, and when the stress wore out, it was too late.
Let's not hide the straightforward fact. The constant traveler is a social degenerate, to put it in an extreme way, who cannot create deep enough connection with his surroundings, especially in terms of strong interpersonal bonds and emotional commitments with others at a certain place to give him or herself enough reason to continue being there. With every move, these travelers continue to tell themselves, "this time it will be different because I will doing X in place Y, where I will do something more in tune with my true interests in a place I will love more." It is setting unrealistic expectations.
Ultimately, the traveler, first and foremost, must escape those delusions. No matter where he goes and what he choose to do next, a few months down the line, the mentality will become the same. Things will become more repetitive, seeing the same faces everyday will become tiresome, and there will be urge to try something new, again. But no one can constantly run for an entire life, going from job to job, place to place every year or so. A more powerful ability than being able to find ways to wiggle out of boredom by going elsewhere is to turn the boring ordinary into the exciting on a daily basis. It is a skill that the author, well, hopes to learn this time around in a new place, again.
And as the author cooked up some noodles in his one-room apartment by himself, lamenting the fact that the more-than-a-year-long adventure in the Philippines will come to an end in a week, amid the last minute arrangements for flights, visas, and apartments, he would occasionally stop and think awhile, on whether this year really changed him all that much, from a perspective outside the destructive realizations gained from working in a particular corporate environment. The results are inconclusive, so much so that he had to reflect on his sense of self a year ago in writing.
That self of exactly one year ago was too concerned with the headaches of being a newly-anointed, inexperienced manager of a fairly large contingency, trying to be philosophical about the "right" methodologies of encouraging productivity and fairness. The author of one year ago was literally too concerned with work, too overwhelmed with responsibility to feel that he had or could be multitasking enough to have a life outside those corporate responsibilities. It is a state of the mind that the unemployed self of one year later find a bit ridiculous and unfathomable.
A wise man once warned, "one cannot just keep running forward to chase a goal, without occasionally stopping to check the surroundings. Because when one feel tired and need to take a breather, one would realize that all the people he started running with disappeared, nowhere to be found in thick crowds." It is true. That author of one year ago was too focused that he forgot to pace himself, preventing a meaningful buildup of something other than work-related stress and thoughts (and occasional travel anecdotes) to entertain himself when work was done and over.
That is perhaps what the adventure traveler do not see in life and the reason that keep them constantly running toward new pastures. Excitement wears away really quickly no matter what is that thing that drew one to the place in the beginning, especially if that one thing happens to be a new job. Work is boring, no matter how exciting it sounds on paper or how it actually was when first started. That is the nature of everything in the world that has at least certain aspect of repetition in its routine. Eating the same for lunch and commuting the same roads take toll on a degrading sense of curiosity.
In essence, when on the surface, the traveler is seeking to escape from the daily routine of doing similar thing with the same people in same places, whether at work or outside work, what the traveler is actually doing is escaping from him or herself, or more precisely, that sense of inability to constantly regenerate excitement and curiosity in a situation that is bound to become more repetitive and more mundane over time. Commitment to work and the stress that came from that commitment only served to cloud the long-term vision to address that need, and when the stress wore out, it was too late.
Let's not hide the straightforward fact. The constant traveler is a social degenerate, to put it in an extreme way, who cannot create deep enough connection with his surroundings, especially in terms of strong interpersonal bonds and emotional commitments with others at a certain place to give him or herself enough reason to continue being there. With every move, these travelers continue to tell themselves, "this time it will be different because I will doing X in place Y, where I will do something more in tune with my true interests in a place I will love more." It is setting unrealistic expectations.
Ultimately, the traveler, first and foremost, must escape those delusions. No matter where he goes and what he choose to do next, a few months down the line, the mentality will become the same. Things will become more repetitive, seeing the same faces everyday will become tiresome, and there will be urge to try something new, again. But no one can constantly run for an entire life, going from job to job, place to place every year or so. A more powerful ability than being able to find ways to wiggle out of boredom by going elsewhere is to turn the boring ordinary into the exciting on a daily basis. It is a skill that the author, well, hopes to learn this time around in a new place, again.
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