They say, “you must travel.” Why? Because you truly find out who you are when you are in a foreign place. Why? Because it is unfamiliar, it is automatically not easy. How do you handle that? Only by traveling do you find out.

There are rude people and nice people everywhere, but this is not nearly as obvious in your home town, where it doesn’t matter to your experience, well-being, or ability to carry out daily tasks, as it does in a foreign country, where you are extremely sensitive to the actions of others.

It is only by traveling that you see the universal power of envy and greed and how those two evils are only made through comparisons and assumptions of how much others have and how little they had to do to gain it.

When you travel, you see that people all over the world and throughout history want to express themselves with art and fashion and colors and designs.

When you travel, you force yourself out of comfort, and the thrill and excitement is scary and uncomfortable. But the reward is learning and wisdom that only comes with experience and practice and being able to handle situations because you’ve been through something similar before. By traveling, you gain confidence. You can survive. You have survived.

Only by traveling can you see the commonalities across the human race, that a smile goes a long way and that kindness is always rewarded. Assumptions are everywhere, and judgements are instinctive for everyone. People are rude, and the people they are rude to get annoyed. Mothers love their babies, and children love to laugh. Each person is doing the best they can. They want happiness, too, and they are trying to achieve that.

With traveling, you gain patience and tolerance, for you understand that we must all share this world with each other.

By traveling, you expose yourself to other cultures and worldviews and other ways of life, and if you let yourself see, really see, what’s in front of you, you will see that deep down, we are all the same.