Does travel change you?
October 25th 2006 21:54
Intrinsic value
It’s worthwhile to be stimulated, made to wonder, provoked, excited, informed, extended.
But if your job involves travel -- you’re a businessman, you're a model, etc -- oh how quickly you weary and long to still your feet.
Most travel is time-consuming, tedious.
Hearts fonder and forgetful
Fonder: -- You worry how things fare in your absence, you pine for them, the cash you subsist on ain't endless, and you miser over how much of it you're spending.
Perhaps you're still at home -- you never left -- you're simply waiting in traffic.
Or travel is unreal, a dream-like time-out. Or a glitch, a distraction.
Or travel is directed at the real. You make plans for all the things you'll do on your return, and all the things you'll change (and your eyes have been opened to the possibility of change).
Forgetful: -- Perhaps travel has opened your eyes to new lives, new homes. Or travel has become home. Or you are homeless.
Do home and belief in home slip from the body (like belief in god slips from the body) -- and you awake one morning to find them gone? Or will home be exactly as you remember? Or will home never again be the home you remember?
The time has passed faster than I realized. And I do not know what this signifies.
Stress
The stress of travel creates and reveals sides to others and yourself.
Can bring out the bitch in you.
Modes and habits
Travel might rebirth you. You have to feel your way, work things out, communicate. The skills of raw adaptation.
The pressures of time: a bus has dumped you, and you must quickly get your bearings, must plan your few hours for maximum utility.
Travel will almost certainly involve choices, and the evolution of decision-making procedures.
Travel might persuade you to look -- to look at the world in certain ways -- to be awake to your environment, to look to be moved, to look for the valuable, to recognize what's most important to you, to judge and evaluate and compare.
To play the part of an alien, to feel yourself an outsider, to see the contingency of things, to realize how you've defined yourself.
Whether such changes are lasting is another question. But there’s a possibility you'll bring these modes and habits home with you. There’s a possibility you’ll see the old anew.
As to whether travel changes your values, broadens your horizons, or in some sense grows your character… I think one is rightly skeptical. It’s all too easy to close your mind -- to leave home, to travel, and to return the same person. And even if you open your mind, there's no guarantee.
The basic reason travel might change you is that experience changes you and travel is supposedly full of novel experience.
The basic reason travel won't change you is that different scenery, in itself, is meaningless -- sitting on a bus through Italian countryside is often the same as sitting on a bus through countryside anywhere.
Change into what?
Are you are building towards a particular point?
Is there such a thing as one human being more developed than another?
Or is there only difference.
It’s worthwhile to be stimulated, made to wonder, provoked, excited, informed, extended.
But if your job involves travel -- you’re a businessman, you're a model, etc -- oh how quickly you weary and long to still your feet.
Most travel is time-consuming, tedious.
Hearts fonder and forgetful
Fonder: -- You worry how things fare in your absence, you pine for them, the cash you subsist on ain't endless, and you miser over how much of it you're spending.
Perhaps you're still at home -- you never left -- you're simply waiting in traffic.
Or travel is unreal, a dream-like time-out. Or a glitch, a distraction.
Or travel is directed at the real. You make plans for all the things you'll do on your return, and all the things you'll change (and your eyes have been opened to the possibility of change).
Forgetful: -- Perhaps travel has opened your eyes to new lives, new homes. Or travel has become home. Or you are homeless.
Do home and belief in home slip from the body (like belief in god slips from the body) -- and you awake one morning to find them gone? Or will home be exactly as you remember? Or will home never again be the home you remember?
The time has passed faster than I realized. And I do not know what this signifies.
Stress
The stress of travel creates and reveals sides to others and yourself.
Can bring out the bitch in you.
Modes and habits
Travel might rebirth you. You have to feel your way, work things out, communicate. The skills of raw adaptation.
The pressures of time: a bus has dumped you, and you must quickly get your bearings, must plan your few hours for maximum utility.
Travel will almost certainly involve choices, and the evolution of decision-making procedures.
Travel might persuade you to look -- to look at the world in certain ways -- to be awake to your environment, to look to be moved, to look for the valuable, to recognize what's most important to you, to judge and evaluate and compare.
To play the part of an alien, to feel yourself an outsider, to see the contingency of things, to realize how you've defined yourself.
Whether such changes are lasting is another question. But there’s a possibility you'll bring these modes and habits home with you. There’s a possibility you’ll see the old anew.
As to whether travel changes your values, broadens your horizons, or in some sense grows your character… I think one is rightly skeptical. It’s all too easy to close your mind -- to leave home, to travel, and to return the same person. And even if you open your mind, there's no guarantee.
The basic reason travel might change you is that experience changes you and travel is supposedly full of novel experience.
The basic reason travel won't change you is that different scenery, in itself, is meaningless -- sitting on a bus through Italian countryside is often the same as sitting on a bus through countryside anywhere.
Change into what?
Are you are building towards a particular point?
Is there such a thing as one human being more developed than another?
Or is there only difference.
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Comment by LaurenD
I think it has to do with the mindset. Either we're open or closed. And maybe we go through stretches of both.
Do we want to cling to our prejudices because they are safe and orderly in a choatic world, or do we crave liberation-- from ourselves most of all?
Do we want to change or do we want to stagnate?
Two people can witness the same scene and have completely different experiences and memories of it.
So we can harden to that experience, say oh yes, we've seen it all before and we're happy being miserable... or we can lose ourselves to something new and come out a little bit different.
I think it's really up to us.
LaurenD
Comment by Cibbuano
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Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
But, just to be argumentative, let me put it this way: can you choose to find something meaningful? Or is the meaningful never a matter of choice? Because if the latter is true, then it might go to show that travel only changes you if you're already made to be changed by travel...
Dear Cibby -- I was stuck with the same people for about a month. I believe the term for this is "cabin fever"... As illustrated by the Simpsons episode where Homer and Burns start hallucinating and throttling each other.
Tourists are inherently annoying things, but I think, after being one, I empathize with them a little better.
Comment by LaurenD
You can choose to close your eyes or you can choose to close them. You can choose to say you're right or you can choose to ask what's right.
That's all I know. The rest is silence.
LaurenD
Comment by Damo
My last big trip was 3 months in Sri Lanka. Can't stand to be around normal tourists or tourist traps. Live amounst the people and you'll see a lot more.
Comment by KarenC
Genghis Gal
My lengthy stays in Asia tested me beyond what I thought was possible. Am I a better person for it? Absolutely.
Have my values changed? Not a lot. But has it broadened my horizons? Yes.
Did it bring out my worst side? Yes. Did it also bring out my best? Yes. And it made me realise how much I prefer my best side to the dark side that, on occasion, was bordering on Darth Vader.
Would I give it up for anything? No. My experiences overseas have made me the person I am today, to sound like a cliche. But without them, I wouldn't know how strong I could be or how weak I could be. And I know these boundaries now and am not afraid of them any longer.
Comment by Adrienne
Comment by postmoderncritic
Postmodern Critic
Relativity Watch
Padsoc
If you're interested in the potential to change and grow through travel your energy will be directed along those lines.
Are you traveling right now, or are you thinking upon past experiences? And where have you been, if I may ask?
Comment by Wendi
Even from state to state, though, one can grow as a person through travel. It gives us an opportunity to see how others live, what they do for fun, the foods they eat that may differ from what we're accustomed to.
I admit, I'm spoiled. I'm blessed with a life that does not require conforming to systems (for the most part). My kids are homeschooled, so we can pack up our lessons and hit the road without missing a beat or having to account for our so called absence. I don't have to clock in at a job outside of the home, so with thanks to laptops and wireless Internet connections, I can take my work with me when I go.
I think the best benefit of travel is that it breaks up the monotony of daily life and offers opportunity for us to indulge our senses, including the sixth sense. It causes our minds to open and helps us reflect more objectively on our own circumstances.
Here's the thing. When I start to get aggravated with home life and the days just seem to run together, motivation wanes and inspiration fades. I begin to complain about all the things I wish I could change, but haven't yet. So I set out on some adventure, be it to the state next door for a weekend, or a trip across the country for a month. Regardless of how long I'm gone, the end result is ALWAYS the same. IT'S GOOD TO BE HOME!
I love Steinbeck's book "Travels with Charlie". It captures my spirit perfectly. But then, the name Wendi does translate to "Wanderer". *smiles*
Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
Thanks for all the comments!
So let me summarize (forgive me for any misreadings and omissions):
Does travel change you?
LaurenD says: It can change your prejudices if you're open to having them challenged. She also points out, I think, that whether an experience counts as a new experience might depend on perspective (so that any experience can count as a new one?).
Cibby says: Yes, it makes you sick of other tourists.
Damo says: Yes, it increases your self-knowledge, because you're courage and resistance are challenged. But to gain the max benefit, one must live among the people.
KarenC says: Yes, it increase your self-knowledge through testing, and quick trips are a no no if you want max benefit, and I think she suggests that knowledge of your limits gives you the power to transcend them. She also expands the discussion of travel from holidays to working overseas for extended periods.
Adrienne I think says "Yes, but". Yes it changes you, but there's a different mindset attached to "vacation" (and perhaps there's the idea that travel best changes you if you have a vacation mindset).
Postmoderncritic I think says that travel gives you many opportunities for self-development (in an unspecified sense) if you're looking to be self-developed. She also notes, I think, that imaginary exploration can yield the same opportunities.
Wendi (I'm paraphrasing quite a lot here) notes that travel can change you through expanding your options and motivating reflection on unsuspecting choices in your life, can re-energize you through breaking monotony, and perhaps in some sense makes you more awake to your surroundings because it provides opportunities for indulging the senses.
Summary of a summary: everyone thinks (I think) that travel (and different types were mentioned) can change you, the main factor being mindset (and different mindsets were cited). The main ways it can change you are in terms of: breaking prejudices, increasing self-knowledge, developing the self, expanding your options, re-energizing you, and making you more awake to your surroundings.
Comment by Lilla
From The Home Front
Enviro Warrior
Dream Herald
Esoteric Bookshop
Yes it does.
Lilla...
Comment by Anonymous