Traveling When Your Life Doesn't Look the Way You Thought It Would

Traveling When Your Life Doesn't Look the Way You Thought It Would

It’s so strange how life turns out despite your dreams and plans.

Children dream of being a professional sports player, a movie star, and a successful astronaut—all together in one life. When we get older, we think we’re being practical by making much more modified plans for our future. We picture the career, the relationship, the family, the house, the retirement, and maybe the trips we’ll finally take when everything else is settled.

It rarely comes to fruition exactly that way either.

Personally, I never thought my world would turn out the way it did. In my fifties, all of my parents are gone. I’m single, I have no children, I’m navigating life with several chronic illnesses, and I work several jobs to make ends meet.

But my life isn’t totally difficult.

I love my home. I maintain several of my own businesses. I continue to manage my chronic illnesses. And through all of that, I travel the globe as well.

What about you?

Did your life change in a way you didn’t expect? Probably.

Have you wanted to travel but wondered whether you should wait and work on making your life a little better first?

Read on.

The Life We Thought We Were Going to Have

Most of us carry around some version of an imaginary life.

We may not even realize we're doing it. It's just there in the background. By this age, I'll be married. By that age, I'll own a house. I'll have this much money saved. My children will be grown. I'll finally have time to myself. I'll be healthy enough to travel. I'll retire and see the world. I'll have somebody to go with me.

Then life starts editing the plan without asking our permission.

Relationships end. People we love die. Careers change. Money gets tight. Parents need care. Our bodies start doing things we never anticipated. Children don't come along, or they grow up and build lives of their own. Retirement doesn't look quite as financially comfortable as we imagined. The person we expected to grow old with isn't there.

Sometimes nothing dramatic happens at all. We simply wake up one day and realize that somehow we arrived at a life that looks very different from the one we pictured twenty or thirty years ago.

There can be a strange kind of grief in that realization.

You can appreciate the life you have and still grieve parts of the life you didn't get.

Those two things can exist at the same time.

I can love my home and wish my mother were still here to visit it. I can be proud of the businesses I've built and wish I didn't have to work quite so hard. I can be grateful that I've learned how to manage my health and still wish managing chronic illness wasn't part of my daily life.

And I can be incredibly grateful for the places I've traveled while acknowledging that travel sometimes takes much more out of me than it once did.

That's real life.

Maybe that's where we need to start talking about travel differently.

“I'll Travel When Things Get Better”

How many times have you said some version of that?

I'll travel when I lose weight.

I'll travel when I have more money.

I'll travel when my health improves.

I'll travel when I meet somebody.

I'll travel when work settles down.

I'll travel after I pay off this debt.

I'll travel when I'm less tired.

I'll travel when I'm not taking care of everybody else.

I'll travel when I feel more confident.

I'll travel when life isn't such a mess.

Some of those are perfectly reasonable considerations. There are times when finances, health, caregiving responsibilities, work, or other circumstances genuinely mean a trip has to wait.

I'm not going to tell you to put a vacation on a credit card you can't afford or ignore your doctor's advice because “life is short.” That's not what this is about.

The problem comes when “not right now” quietly turns into “not until my life is perfect.”

Because perfect can be a very long wait.

If you live with a chronic illness, you may not suddenly wake up completely healthy next year. If you're single, the perfect travel companion may not magically appear. If money is tight, you may always need to travel differently from someone with a large vacation budget. If you've lost someone important to you, life may become beautiful again, but it won't become exactly what it was before that loss.

At some point, we have to ask a difficult question:

What if this is the life I need to learn how to live?

Not tolerate.

Not give up on.

Live.

Maybe You Don't Need to Fix Your Life Before You Travel

There is a difference between improving your circumstances and postponing your entire life until your circumstances improve.

Of course I want things to get better. I want my businesses to grow. I want more financial security. I want good health days. I want fewer worries and more freedom. I'm certainly not suggesting that we stop trying to improve our lives.

But I don't want to spend ten years preparing to someday enjoy being alive.

Travel has taught me that those two things don't have to be separate.

I can work toward a better financial future and find an affordable trip I can take now.

I can manage chronic illness and travel in a way that allows for rest.

I can miss the people I've lost and experience joy somewhere new.

I can be single and go somewhere I've always wanted to see.

I can have responsibilities waiting for me at home and take a few days to remember there is more to me than those responsibilities.

Maybe travel doesn't have to be the prize you receive after you've successfully solved your life.

Maybe it can simply be part of your life.

Stop Comparing Your Trip to Someone Else's Trip

This may be one of the biggest traps of modern travel.

We see somebody else's version of it constantly.

They fly business class to Paris. They spend three weeks backpacking through Southeast Asia. They hike through the mountains. They visit six European cities in twelve days. They wake up at sunrise, spend all day sightseeing, go out for dinner, and somehow still look refreshed in every photograph.

Meanwhile, you're thinking, I need a nap after the airport.

Welcome to my world.

Travel doesn't become less valuable because you need to do it differently.

Maybe you can only afford three nights instead of two weeks. Maybe you need a hotel with an elevator. Maybe you need to sit down every couple of hours. Maybe your medication schedule determines when you leave the room. Maybe you need a taxi instead of walking another mile. Maybe you skip an attraction because your body is telling you that you've had enough.

Or maybe you're perfectly healthy but your finances are limited. You stay outside the city center. You eat breakfast from the grocery store. You travel during the off-season. You save for months before you go.

Maybe you're nervous about traveling alone, so instead of beginning with Italy, you spend one night in a city two hours from home.

It still counts.

There is no travel committee waiting at the airport to decide whether you traveled impressively enough.

The goal isn't to travel like somebody else.

The goal is to make travel fit your life.

Read my article, Make the trip work for your body, your budget and your life. You will discover how to make travel work for you, not how it looks on social media.

Your Life May Require a Different Kind of Courage

We tend to picture courageous travelers doing dramatic things—climbing mountains, jumping out of airplanes, trekking through jungles, or heading across the world with nothing but a backpack.

Sometimes courage looks a lot quieter.

It can be booking a room for one.

It can be getting on an airplane after years of telling yourself that you're too old to travel alone.

It can be asking the hotel whether they can accommodate something you need because of your health.

It can be admitting that you can't keep up with the itinerary everyone else wants.

It can be telling your family that you're taking a few days away even though you've always been the person everyone depends on.

It can be taking your first trip after losing someone you once traveled with.

It can even be coming back to the hotel at 2:00 in the afternoon, closing the curtains and going to sleep instead of forcing yourself through another attraction because you paid to be there.

That's not failure.

Sometimes that's exactly what allows you to keep traveling.

The Vacation You Can Take Matters More Than the Vacation You Can't

It's easy to build travel into something so big that we convince ourselves it's impossible.

When someone says they want to travel, they may immediately start imagining thousands of dollars, international flights, two weeks away from work, complicated planning and a perfect Instagram-worthy destination.

But travel has a much wider definition than that.

Maybe your life right now can handle Europe.

Wonderful.

Maybe it can handle four days in another state.

Wonderful.

Maybe you can drive somewhere two hours away, stay one night, eat somewhere you've never eaten before, walk through a neighborhood you've never seen and come home the next afternoon.

That's travel too.

Sometimes smaller trips are exactly what help us learn what we're capable of.

They're also a wonderful way to test ourselves. How does your body respond to sleeping somewhere else? How much activity can you comfortably handle? How do you feel eating alone? What do you tend to forget? How much money do you realistically spend? What would you change next time?

Instead of waiting until you're capable of taking your dream vacation, take the trip that fits the person you are today.

The bigger trip can still be waiting for you.

Want to travel on your time and by your needs? Are there places you've dreamt of going to but you're not sure how to begin? Join the Single, Sick and Broke community! You'll receive FREE resources that will make travel easier for you. Sign up with your email today!

You Are Allowed to Change the Plan

This applies to the trip itself, but it also applies to life.

There is a strange pressure to stick with decisions simply because we once made them.

We thought we'd get married.

We thought we'd have children.

We thought we'd live somewhere else.

We thought we'd have a certain career.

We thought we'd retire at a certain age.

We thought we'd travel with our spouse.

We thought we'd have more money.

We thought our bodies would continue doing what they did at thirty.

Things changed.

So the plan can change too.

That's not giving up. That's responding to reality.

The same thing happens when you're traveling.

Your itinerary said museum, lunch, walking tour and dinner.

Your body says bed.

Change the plan.

You thought you'd spend $200 on an excursion, but an unexpected bill came before the trip.

Change the plan.

You thought you'd be comfortable traveling completely alone, but you're nervous.

Book a group tour for part of the trip.

You planned seven days and realize four would be easier.

Take four.

The purpose of the trip is not to obey the itinerary.

The itinerary works for you.

Don't Wait to Become the Person You Thought You'd Be

This one may be difficult.

Sometimes we're not waiting for circumstances to change. We're waiting for ourselves to change.

We imagine a future version of ourselves who is healthier, thinner, richer, braver, less anxious, more organized and somehow much better at life.

She'll travel.

But what about you?

The person reading this right now?

Doesn't she deserve something too?

You don't need to become fearless before you travel. You can be nervous and still go.

You don't need to become wealthy. You can build a trip around what you can actually afford.

You don't have to pretend your illness doesn't exist. You can plan around your body instead of fighting it.

You don't need somebody else to validate the trip by going with you.

And you certainly don't need to apologize because the life you're living doesn't resemble the one you thought you'd have.

This is the life that's here.

There is still an enormous amount you can do with it.

Sometimes Travel Doesn't Fix Anything

I want to say this because I think it's important.

Travel isn't therapy in a suitcase.

A beautiful beach doesn't erase grief. A plane ticket doesn't cure loneliness. Chronic illness doesn't disappear because you crossed an international border. Money problems will still be waiting when you get home. If you're unhappy with something in your life, a week away may give you perspective, but it won't necessarily solve it.

Sometimes people talk about travel as though going somewhere new automatically transforms you.

It can.

But sometimes you just have a really nice Tuesday in another country.

And that's enough.

You laugh.

You eat something wonderful.

You see something you've only seen in photographs.

You sit somewhere beautiful.

You meet someone interesting.

You navigate a train station you were convinced you'd never figure out.

You wake up in a hotel room and realize, I actually got myself here.

Those moments don't have to fix your life to add something valuable to it.

Build a Life That Has Room for Something Good

Maybe that's what this is really about.

Not escaping your life.

Not pretending the difficult parts aren't there.

Not waiting for some perfect future.

Just making room for something good inside the life you already have.

For me, travel is one of those things.

My life didn't follow the plan.

There are people I desperately wish were still here. There are physical limitations I never expected to navigate. There are financial realities that influence the decisions I make. There are responsibilities, workdays, doctor's appointments, bills and ordinary problems.

There are also plane tickets.

There are hotel rooms.

There are ridiculous travel mistakes.

There are beautiful places.

There are moments when I stop, look around and think, I can't believe I'm actually here.

One doesn't erase the other.

That's the part I wish more people understood.

A difficult life doesn't have to be an empty life.

Start With the Life You Have

If you've been waiting to travel because your life isn't quite where you thought it would be, don't start by asking yourself where you should go.

Start with something more practical.

What could travel realistically look like in my life right now?

Not five years from now.

Not after everything is fixed.

Now.

Maybe you have $300, one weekend and enough energy for a short drive.

Start there.

Maybe you've saved for years, you're physically able to travel and the only thing stopping you is the fact that you don't have anyone to go with.

Start there.

Maybe you have chronic illness and you're afraid of what will happen if you have a bad day away from home.

Don't ignore that fear. Plan for it. Give yourself rest days. Research medical care. Bring what you need. Choose refundable options when you can. Make a Plan A, Plan B and Plan C for your days so changing the itinerary doesn't feel like the trip has fallen apart.

Maybe grief has changed everything and you're not even sure whether traveling will feel good anymore.

Start small.

You aren't signing a contract promising to become a world traveler.

You're simply giving yourself permission to see what's still possible.

It helps to know you can travel any way you wish. Read, Get there your way: Why there's no right or wrong way to travel.

Your Story Isn't Over Because the Original Plan Changed

If you had shown me a picture of my life today when I was twenty-five, I'm not sure what I would have thought.

This wasn't the plan.

But I've learned something I couldn't have understood then.

A life can turn out completely differently than you expected and still contain things worth looking forward to.

You can lose people and still find joy.

You can live with illness and still have adventures.

You can struggle financially and still create experiences.

You can be single and still see the world.

You can be scared and still go.

You can be exhausted and still be proud of what you managed to do.

You can change your plans.

You can rest.

You can come home early.

You can try again.

And you don't have to wait until you've fixed every imperfect part of your life before you begin.

Maybe your life doesn't look the way you thought it would.

Mine doesn't either.

But we're still here.

And there are still places to go.

Get there your way.

You have a right to travel regardless of your condition or if your budget is smaller than you'd like. Join the Single, Sick and Broke Traveler community! Sign up with your email below.

The Single, Sick & Broke Traveler

Travel stories for the brave and budget-conscious.

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nessa@singlesickbroketraveler.com

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