Inspiration: The Highest Form of Recreation: Wake Up!

"We travel to wake up. Life is swift and hazy. We are habitual creatures, following mildly comfortable ruts. As Miguel de Unamuno said, “To fall into a habit is to cease to be.” The great religions, the poets, the philosophers, the guy at the corner store (if he stops to think about it) well tell us that we live most of our lives in a sleepy mist. Travel, like the best friend we’ll ever have, gives us a little slap, “Wake up! Be.”

We travel because it’s the highest form of re-creation. Every time we step out of life’s routine we have the chance, the challenge to re-create ourselves anew. To decide who we are, what we like, what we can’t stand, what we crave, what brings us joy, what repels and attracts us. We always have this fundamental chance, but we don’t usually grasp it. The good traveler, as opposed to the traveler who’s just getting cartered around, learns that this old personality is marvelously flexible, fantastically adaptable, fare more capacious than he ever thought. That we always have the power to choose, who we are, to re-create ourselves as we see fit. "

Credit: Geographic Expeditions, San Francisco

Photo: Udaipur, India