Travel Soul Therapy

WHEN IMPULSE TO TRAVEL LEADS TO FINDING PURPOSE IN LIFE.

Could our impulse to travel be a yearning for finding purpose in life? What feels like a natural curiosity, might be a response to the inner quest for change, purpose and meaning?

A wish to get away, or go to see exotic places or to experience yourself alone in essence could be a yearning for authentic life, where we know ourselves intimately. Have you noticed the quality of your internal drive to go travel? Have you looked behind your impulse to travel?

As Andrew Lam puts it here: "We travel to find ourselves".

The feeling leading to making decision to travel could be seen on a surface as a subtle spike of boredom, a very low level impatience with what is going on in your life right now.

Something might be missing. Or perhaps the feeling of general buoyancy of knowing where you are psychologically, or certainty about your plans suddenly lose momentum.

You feel less confidence in your intentions and even a spasm of meaninglessness. There might be a question of “why am I doing this?”.

Or you might be overcome with feelings of waiting for something to “fall into place” while what you are doing now appears fake as a mirage or a dream. 

Dance of Illusion at Hemis Monastery in Ladakh.

This internal reality could be felt as not being connected to life, feeling of not being recognized or not feeling much purpose to anything. As we seeking to balance these feelings, we are going through psychic reorganization and consequently finding purpose in life.

The best and most successful way of going through this process of finding purpose in life, not that it is the easiest, is to accept yourself and feel all the feelings that could rise — hopelessness, anger, frustration, anger or loneliness without seeing them as a permanent state or totality of who you are.

By accepting yourself wherever you are, you create a comfortable environment of integration when you can admit your shadow — a part of consciousness that you have hidden away or denied to face about yourself.

There’s tremendous amount of creative energy is hidden within this system of maintenance.

For this reason alone travel is meaningful as it offers a freedom to look at your psyche exposed, while being removed from activating triggers or enabling agents of our relationships that keep these energies engaged and hidden.

Ruins Above Hundar, Nubra Valley, Ladakh

This what makes travel meaningful and rewarding — it presents a space for that part of ourselves that wants to be hidden to unravel safely without external witnesses. It happens in the safety of anonymous environment where we don’t have any history or demands to hold expectations of others. Meaningful travel avails the environment where we can bring our hidden process into view of our awareness without caution for being interrupted, misinterpreted or corrupted by unwelcome influences. 

If you detect that your impulse to travel is much more profound than a simple craving for leisure, if you notice that deep down there’s a quest for change, desire for something unknown, yearning for freedom, for finding purpose in life, then you may follow these practical suggestions to stay steady through this crucial period often filled with fog of confusion, chaos and doubt.

FINDING PURPOSE IN LIFE — HOW TO FIND VALUE THROUGH UNCERTAINTY, FEAR AND DOUBT.

Look at your beliefs.

• Do you believe that you experience this state because something is wrong with you or you did something wrong. Or you accept that this search for meaning and a connection to something deeply satisfying is a natural process and some kind of shift is required of you. Accepting it, opens your awareness to emerging information. Go with a flow.

Trust that there’s a purpose to being here.

• Take a  position of a student in life, to be receptive and open to new directions. Let go of blame. Don’t struggle against the effect, which you now experiencing. Your experience has a cause and you are to learn the how to relate to it positively, so that you would grow from it. Your functioning in a habitual way is disrupted and a new space is opening for choosing differently. You are forced out of comfort zone.

Ask yourself what you’ve been tolerating.

• Take a note of what was happening before you had an impulse to travel for finding purpose in life, or a deeper meaning for it. Something required change in your life. You ask yourself: “What is it that I want ultimately feel?”, “What is true for me?”. When you honestly note what you’ve been maintaining or tried to avoid facing and resolve it, you experience a surge of creative energy that will begin to reorganize your world very quickly. Please note that your disowned feelings will seem to be coming from other people in external situations.

Confront your story of fundamental limitation.

• It is a story we have to run and hide behind when things get tough. It is usually an excuse to stay safe and avoid changing. It is a story of what we believe is our inherent limitation. Something we’ve kept telling ourselves since the age two or three strengthening it whenever we felt helpless. Something like “I am too old now” or “I wish I was more intelligent” and so on. On another hand we project what we don't want to change onto others, unconsciously assigning them responsibility for our feelings and insisting on the world to change.

Let the feelings be felt.

• Allow yourself space and time to feel the emotions. Acknowledge them and watch their dance. Use of writing the events as they happen offers a safe way to bring up your feelings and learn what you need to know.

Give yourself time to be alone.

• Spending time alone is the best time for self-reflection. Spend time alone to listen to the wisdom of your heart. Being alone with yourself brings you to a place of power, where you will be finding your purpose in life — a place where shift is going to happen.

Use this time for self-renewal.

• Look for positive values this time can offer for you. Be on a lookout for regrets about the past and fears of the future creeping up your consciousness. Keep yourself focused on the present. Remind yourself to be focused on what is going on right now. Doing this engages self-directed neuroplasticity of a brain, rewiring it with new connections reflecting emotional balance and clarity. Doing physical exercises or spending time in nature is very beneficial.

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