Written by Jonathan Zalesne
Part III of my travel blog series.
One of the most special things about traveling alone is having the opportunity to do what you want, when you want, all day long. As a woman, I often find myself in the “people pleasing” role. When someone asks me, “what do you want to do tonight” I typically respond with, “no preferences, totally up to you.” And I would do this in all aspects of my life. “What do you want to eat?” “I’m up for anything.” “Where do you want to go on vacation?” “Wherever.” “What do you want to do this weekend?” “I’m open.” It was this pervasive experience of never asking myself what I wanted. Instead, I just went along with whatever worked for everyone else. I put a positive spin on this, saying I was just “go with the flow.” But really, I have preferences, I have desires, I have specific things that I want! I just wasn’t giving myself the opportunity to even think them, let alone voice them.
One of the most important lessons that I personally needed to learn was how to give voice to my inner voice, my inner knowing, my intuition, if you will. And what better way to learn to do that than being in a place where I didn’t need to answer to anyone. Didn’t need to consider anyone else’s wants/needs because I was all alone traveling.
I discovered a few ways to practice listening to my intuition while traveling that I would like to share with you. The first, was giving myself space to be still and get clear. I talked about this in my last blog post, so please give it a read if you’re interested to learn more. The next thing that I did was practice at restaurants. I would read through a menu once, and notice what stood out to me. I wouldn’t judge the dishes based on cost or healthiness, I would just feel into what my body wanted. I almost always had a gut reaction to something on menu – something would catch my eye and I would know, “that’s what I want.” Outside of this trip, I would then check in with the people I was dining with and ask, “what are you getting?” Sometimes I would be swayed by what they wanted, “ooh that sounds good” or “should we split XYZ?” Sometimes, I would read the prices and then change my mind. And that’s fine, there is nothing wrong with that, but in the practice of growing your intuition and learning to trust it, that’s not going to work. Because of cost/health factors/whatever else, this may not be doable all of the time. But try it when fitting, give yourself permission to trust yourself, order exactly what you want, don’t second guess it, and go. See how it feels when you trust yourself wholeheartedly without doubting or second guessing yourself.
You can apply this idea and principle to anything. Maybe you try it at the grocery store in the chip aisle. There are 2,000 options, and you look them over, then feel into, “what do I want” not “what will my kids like” or “what will be the healthiest choice for me” or “what will last the longest,” no. “What do I want, right now, for me” and then get it. Maybe you try this idea shopping, or deciding what to do for your free evening. Ideally, I like this practice as an “in the moment” practice. “What do I want right now” because that is when your intuition is strongest. It is hard to feel into a knowing of, “what will I want in 5 days,” because it will most likely change. So this practice is specifically for in the moment, learning to trust your gut.
The other important thing is that you need to take action. To build up the muscle of trusting your intuition, you need to listen to that inner voice by taking action. This is how you can prove to yourself that you can trust yourself in every moment. If you want to learn more ways to prioritize yourself, get in contact with one of our individual therapists.