It’s a year to the date, since I set off on my epic adventure. 

And what an adventure it was! I explored the Americas – trekking among majestic mountains and valleys of Peru, ziplining across gorges in Ecuador and Costa Rica, snorkelling with nurse sharks and stingrays in Belize, surfing off a volcano in Nicaragua; I wandered around Mayan ruins in Guatemala and Mexico, danced the night away in Colombia, crisscrossed cities in the U.S. and hiked along breathtaking lakes in Canada. I travelled to the other side of the world and experienced spectacular sunrises in Sri Lanka and majestic mosques in Oman and Abu Dhabi. I also enjoyed fantastic trips to a handful of countries much closer to home, in Europe. I had the most wonderfully exciting and magical time, and never wanted it to end. (Click here for a list of the places and countries I visited). 

It was a year I had always dreamed of, but never really thought would happen. (In case you missed it, here’s the article that explains why I went travelling).

It’s been just over three months since I put my backpack away, and settled back into life in the UK. My life these days is so very different from the life I left in April 2022. It’s been enriched in many ways. Here are three things I took away from my year of travel:

• Live Your Life with Intention

Life is short. Yet, we often spend our lives on autopilot. 

We lead lives based on decisions we made about our careers, relationships, friendships, hobbies, goals in our teens or early twenties and we rarely question those decisions as we change and grow. Or we find ourselves in a routine, doing the same things over and over again and don’t ask if our routines and habits are in line with our values and purpose.

I was working in a job that I loved which didn’t love me back, living in a city I was no longer keen on, and starting to feel socially isolated. I had always had my holidays to look forward to but even that began to feel sad, like I was wishing my life away until the next holiday.

On my travels, I noticed how much I really enjoyed every day. Yes, there was a lot of novelty and excitement but there were also some quiet days. The difference was that I was being very thoughtful about my days and engaging in actions that aligned with my purpose (which to be fair, at that time, was about having maximum enjoyment).

However I have carried that principle over to my ‘regular’ life. I am clear on what my desires, my dreams and my goals are; and everyday I engage in actions that align with, and strengthen, my relationship to those values. It means I am being very thoughtful about how, where, on what and with whom I am spending my time. It means I am no longer letting life pass me by but actively taking control of each day. It means at the end of each day I feel a sense of achievement and fulfilment. Best of all, I am enjoying the process, and no longer wishing my life away. 

• Live Your Life Now 

We have been brought up thinking that it’s okay to ‘suffer through’ our working years, in the hopes of having the opportunity to enjoy our lives after retirement. However, we spend over a third of our lives at work.  How much of our lives are we willing to waste, staying in terrible jobs or working under terrible conditions, in the pursuit of ‘retirement’? (or the prestige, security, money associated with our jobs). 

I thought the way I was working was the only way to work. I was overstretched, underappreciated, burdened with responsibilities and unable to function in other areas of my life because of my job. I knew all this and yet it took me two years to make the decision to quit my job. Ultimately, I chose to quit, because it made no sense to go back to a job that was making me ill.  

That decision was much easier to accept when I was globetrotting, less so when I was sitting at home for weeks watching my bank balance get further depleted. Thankfully I landed a job that gives me the perfect work-life balance. I look forward to, and enjoy, the days I’m at work and I also have enough downtime in the week to pursue other interests. I am living my life of joy and satisfaction right now. 

I’m inordinately grateful for this, and recognise that my job and lack of dependents puts me in a very privileged position. I am not suggesting you quit your job but I do want you to ask yourself the question, ‘How much am I deferring my enjoyment of life?’ or ‘ What is standing in the way of enjoying my life’ and ‘What can I do to help me live a life of joy and satisfaction now?’.  Take action and make those changes, live your life now. 

• Enrich Your Life with Your Relationships 

Travel, especially long-term travel, forces you to become comfortable with transient relationships. A chance meeting on a walking tour, leads to an intense couple of days together where you are long lost best friends, only to part and never meet again. I learnt that people come into your life for many reasons. The value of a relationship is in the exchange of ideas, the experiences you have together, the learning that you take away and how you use that to grow as an individual.  

I learnt to be fearless in reaching out to connect with others. Grab a seat at the breakfast table with that other solo traveller and strike up a conversation. Put your phone away and introduce yourself to the stranger sitting next to you on the bus. That long lost college friend, family friend, relative, colleague? Send them a text or DM, arrange that meetup. You’d be surprised at how many people are gracious enough to give you their time or open up their homes to you. You’d be surprised at how lovely they feel that you thought about them or reached out to them. You’d be surprised at how much you’ll enjoy and be enriched by those connections.  

I was humbled by the love shown to me by friends, old and new, and it reminded me to not take these relationships for granted. I am trying to be more intentional in my relationships – to make time for, and invest, in the people who matter to me. 

• What’s Next for Me? 

I have set goals for the year that require me to take a leap of faith and live my life outside of my comfort zone. I’ve said no to that comfortable substantive NHS consultant job and opted instead for a locum job, one that is more aligned with my goal to have a better work life balance. I am working towards building a business, having always described myself as ‘someone who is not into business’. I am seeking out and making more connections in my local and wider community, ignoring the ‘introvert’ label I’ve always held onto. 

Of course, you don’t need to travel to learn these lessons. In fact you may already know these things and live your life by them. If so, well done you! I came to these realisations at the grand old age of 36, and I am thoroughly enjoying learning to live my life with these ideas at the forefront. I would love to share what I am doing differently that I think has helped. If you would like to know more about any of these ideas, leave a comment below.