The ability to see the outside world is an amazing gift. It used to be fairly common for young people finishing up their studies to backpack around Europe before heading into the working world. It has become increasingly common for young people to take what is called a ‘gap year’. This occurs between high school and post-secondary. This year is either filled with working or travelling, sometimes both. It’s very important to take time for yourself; to allow for that time to create an identity outside of parents and school. Travelling is an amazing opportunity to learn about the world, and yourself, at the same time.
How Travelling Helps Your Mind
Imagine you were born and raised in a small community. The population is less than 1000 people and is made up of mostly your family. Everyone looks the same, speaks the same and has the same culture. You see the same sights and hear the same sounds. Now you’re ready to leave this community. You want to go to post-secondary and see what it has to offer you. Suddenly you panic. You’re stressed out and you can feel the weight on your mind. It may not seem like it, but now is the perfect time to travel. Not only does it allow you to learn what the world is about you can begin to form your own opinion and learn to identify who you are as a person. You will feel more relaxed and you won’t feel like your life is scripted for you. When travelling, you are the boss.
Finding Yourself
As we grow, we develop our personalities; our likes and dislikes. We take more control over what food we like to eat, what music we want to listen to and what information we see as valuable. The benefit of travelling is that it allows you to interact with different cultures across the world. You can taste new food, see things from a viewpoint you might not get ‘back home’. It’s a fantastic way to reveal the differences and similarities all cultures have to offer. And of course, the view is fantastic.
Getting There
Not everyone has thousands of dollars waiting to be spent on a travelling trip. It can be intimidating to plan and execute this kind of journey if you don’t know how you’re going to cover it. A very popular method of financing such a trip is through crowdfunding. With this type of fund-raising your family, friends, neighbours and community as a whole can contribute to your trip. The online crowdfunding programs are very popular. With a site like Plumfund.com you can set up a campaign and bring in donations from all over to help support your trip.
Travelling is definitely something everyone should do at least once. Even if you just visit a new town, state, province, country even once, you will learn something. You don’t have to go to the other side of the world to expand your horizons. But it doesn’t hurt.