You woke up before the crack of dawn to catch your flight home, you rush to the airport, and you discover your flight is delayed by 7 hours.
You’re sitting on the beaches of Punta Cana with one too many empty margarita glasses next to your beach chair, and it’s only 11am.
You have met the most alluring, most kind German journeyman at a bar in Ireland, danced and talked the night away, and you both want to spend the next day together… but he has no phone or computer with which you’d keep in contact.
None of these situations are inherently bad, but they may bring about some stressful or negative thoughts from deep within you. How would you normally deal with these types of situations? Would you act with love, trust, and optimism… or would you act with nervousness, doubt, and anger? Would it be a mixture of these? Take a moment to reflect back on these situations and imagine how each would make you feel.
It doesn’t matter what religion or kind of spirituality you associate yourself with, but it’s important to bring it with you wherever you go. It’s not something you should shove under the rug as soon as you hop on a plane, train, bus, boat or car to a place that’s not home. It’s part of who you are, so in order to stay in alignment with who you truly are, it must come with you.
It’s far too easy to let stressful or upsetting situations get the best of you, to keep trudging through and suppress the negative feelings… onto the next thing on your itinerary! Until it builds up so much that you blow up and let all the stress ruin something you’ve been looking forward to. It’s easy to ignore your inner child, the part of you that is nagging at you for a nap, for a rest day, for a connection to a comforting energy. It’s also easy to let worry eat away the fun you could be having. For many, our spiritual practices are what keep us afloat in this crazy hurricane of a world we reside in, so why is it so easy to drop our practice as soon as we have the chance to experience a new place? We may want to focus only on making sure our vacation or exploration goes the way we planned, or we want to leave all responsibility at home so we can nourish our wild side.
What happens when something suddenly goes awry or you just feel a sense of imbalance? It happens more often than you may think… and coming back to your Self, asking it what it needs, is the first step. Deep breaths, a calm atmosphere, your book, journal, mantra or song of choice, and your Self. That may be all you need to tap into the energy that got you to that place. Maybe you need nothing at all except a quiet place to meditate or a church to pray in.
It’s a good idea to write or speak your intentions for the day each morning, as to set the tone for how you want your day to be. If you’re a solo traveler, it can be really fun (and sort of a reset) to write or read while having lunch or hanging at a bar. It may even attract people curious about what you’re writing/reading, starting a conversation that could change your whole day. Before bed, I like to reflect by writing or saying three (or more) good things that happened that day. These sorts of practices are simple, don’t take much time, and they make you feel a sense of control, gratitude, and peace. Small yet meaningful, on-the-go spiritual practices will keep you grounded, so that the hustle and bustle of traveling and meeting new people doesn’t launch you so far into the clouds that it’s difficult or painful to come down.
You may be wondering, “Did those first three situations really happen to her? How did she deal with them!?” Ha! Only the third one… 😉 I tuned into my higher self and decided to put my trust in the Universe. I wrote and I read my book (Lunar Abundance by Ezzie Spencer), I existed with optimism… and we found each other the next day… and again in Killarney… and again in Galway… but that’s a whole other story, one for a novel to be quite honest.
Thus, when planning your next getaway, write in some time each day to get spiritual. It doesn’t have to be much, 5/10/15 minutes here and there could ultimately save you lots of time that would have been dedicated to worry or regret. Your soul will thank you… and so will your travel buddies.
Stay connected ∞
Kayla,
Feminine Boutique Blog 