Before travel entered our lives, we were stuck in a rut. We had been together for nearly a decade and even though we still loved each other, we were beginning to drift apart. Work had taken over our lives and our biggest excitement on the weekend was deciding what movie to see and where we were going to eat dinner.
When we did eat out, we were that couple you see staring off in silence eavesdropping on other people’s conversations because we didn’t have anything to say to each other. We didn’t have any hobbies and life was boring. I remember my parents asking me once what we did on our days off.
Table of Contents
Getting out of a Rut in Life
I didn’t have an answer for them because we didn’t do anything. We were going through the motions of life instead of living life. We spent too much time at work and too little time on ourselves and if something didn’t change, we would lose each other.
“Get out there and travel, it doesn’t have to be for a year or 6 months, all you need is a few weeks to try something new. It can inspire and enrich your life like you never thought possible. I know it has for us.”
How Travel Saved our Marriage
It was when I was at work asking people where I should go on my next vacation a colleague, Lana said, “you have to go to Thailand.”
At this point in our lives, we had never been anywhere, and Thailand wasn’t very appealing to us. We were thinking more along the lines of a beach in Mexico or a cruise to the Bahamas.
She pressed the subject though and brought in photos the next day to show me how beautiful it was and how we could stay on a beach hut for a few dollars a night. I was intrigued.
Off to Thailand
She told me that we had to go for at least a month and we had to try rock climbing in Raleigh.
We had to eat Green Curry Chicken on Khao San Road and I had to bring a journal to write about my day and draw pictures of the dramatic sunsets.
In a sense, Lana started my writing career.
To this day, I still don’t know how she talked us out of our two-week vacation to Mexico and sent us on a 5-week odyssey to Thailand, but she did and it was the best thing that ever happened to us.
In Thailand, we tried things that we never thought possible.
We went rock climbing in Raleigh just like she told us, we took hikes through the jungle, swam in waterfalls and tried sea kayaking through a mangrove forest.
We were introduced to a culture that at that point, we had only seen in the movies. We saw Monks walking in the streets and visited pagodas housing giant Buddhas. Exposed to New Cultures and Loving it!
Thailand was a Dream
We felt like we were reborn.
And even though it took some adjustment to learn to talk to one another again and be with each other every day for 35 days, we rediscovered the reason we fell in love in the first place.
We both loved to try new things and we realized that we had the same interests and enjoyed the same types of activities.
When we first met we had dreams and hopes and were active and vibrant people, but over the years we lost that energy and were stuck in a rut.
We were depressed and things were starting to fall apart. We didn’t inspire one another anymore.
Thailand changed all that.
It had awoken something in us both that had been dormant for years….Passion
When you are on the road, you can be someone else.
Travel gives you permission to do something crazy that you would never dream of doing at home, like white water rafting or jumping out of a plane.
When you come home you can take the parts of that person you became while traveling and put it into your every day life.
Taking our Adventures Home!
Adventures in Ontario – Home
When we returned home after that first trip to Thailand, we were inspired to keep the adventure going.
We signed up for rock climbing lessons and took up scuba diving and snowboarding.
Our lives were changing right before our eyes, it was becoming exciting again and best of all, we were doing it together.
Instead of going to the movies each weekend to escape our monotonous lives, we wrote our own story and went camping or mountain biking. Suddenly when we went to dinner, we had a lot to talk about.
Travel Can Transform You
You’ll be amazed at how many opportunities will fall into your lap when you travel.
By seeing the world and being exposed to new things, your life will open up to new opportunities.
With your, new found confidence and optimism people will want to be around you because you have a story to tell and something to say.
Travel will bring you success.
Ordinary people can live extraordinary lives. With every risk that you take in life, something extraordinary comes out of it.
We are living proof. If two regular people like us can live our dreams anyone can.
The reason we put up articles and videos showing us facing our fears is that we want everyone to know that we all have fears. We are all afraid of of change and facing life’s challenges.
But if you do face them head-on, life will reward you.
We want to give people the courage to follow through on their life’s dreams.
We have received so many emails and comments from people telling us that they talked their spouse into going on an adventure after seeing that we travel as a couple.
Or they saw an article talking about how terrified we were about doing something but we did it anyway and it inspired them to go out there and face their fears too.
That is the greatest reward for us.
Whenever we reach someone, we know we are doing our job and it motivates us to continue to share our story.
We feel that everyone has the right to live the best life possible and instead of following all the naysayers, we want to inspire everyone to live their dreams.
We were in a fog for so long and woke up just a few years ago.
So get out there and travel, it doesn’t have to be for a year or 6 months, all you need is a few weeks to try something new.
It can inspire and enrich your life like you never thought possible. I know it has for us.
- Read More:
- How Travel Literally Saved My Life
- How Travel Changed our Lives and Turned Us into Adventurers
- Live the Good Light – Transitions Lenses for Every Need
- How to be a Travel Blogger – From Dream to Reality and How We Make Money
