Why Travel Whispers to the Heart

Why is the idea of exploring unchartered territory so intriguing to us as human beings? Touching places we’ve never seen before, having other peoples touch our hearts like never before? It’s been the driving force for the expansion of mankind – going where none dared venture before just to see what’s on the other side. But just what exactly is IT? What is that something that tickles us from the inside out, compelling us to leap into the unknown? Is it the unknown itself or simply an innate longing to discover? There must be some illusive thought of adventure behind why travel whispers to the heart in the way that it does.

Stirring up the spirit, evocatively ensnaring the imagination at its endless possibilities. It’s a force that’s driven men to madness. Either casting caution to the winds and diving headlong into the exploration they’re so desperately seeking, or plaguing them as an unattainable dream and despairingly “go to the grave with the song still in them,” as Thoreau once said. Surely, there’s a case that argues that the very fibers of our makeup are bound to an innate sense of exploration, least of all curiosity.

Why else would those notables of history have been compelled to venture into tempestuous waters – galavant through our world’s hearts of darkness – with no true promise of success or payout to their explorations? Why is human kind always trying to tip the scales of science and technology further past what even appears to be comprehensible? And why is that “final frontier” of outer space the center of curiosity for much of the globe?

Is not the drive to discover constantly, to experience the unknown, and to shed light on places hidden to ourselves almost always at the forefront of our very existence as people? Travel is the closest thing we have as average individuals to fill that need for discovery. It could be argued that as creatures of routine, cleaving to the habitual, we’re better suited to schedules and regiments. Naturally discipline is healthy, producing productivity and progress, but does not even the simplest of souls find pleasure in a walk? Don’t even the most typical of working beings still strive for some sort of vacation or time away from their normal life at some point or another? Clearly that inner curiosity is never entirely silenced. Surely the innate is never really able to be snuffed out. Ignored. Disagreed with at times. Even bashed because “I don’t like change,” but is the call to see something new ever really quieted?

Why travel whispers to the heart is shrouded in the intangible, and yet completely tangible to those willing reach out and take it. For those who have captured it, handled it, opened up a part of their spirit to be reunited with a portion of themselves that felt lost to the unraveling years will surely understand. They understand that progress is made when they travel. Growth and change go hand-in-hand with it, because you have allowed yourself to be vulnerable even if you don’t see it. Even if you never breath a word of what you’ve felt to another living soul. You’ve allowed a sensation – something very much alive inside of you – to pierce straight through to your heart.

It’s the peace you soak in with the day’s end and its glistening saturation of colors splayed across the sky from the steadily setting sun. It’s the moment you peak over the edge of the mountain side and feel that jump in your gut from the exhilarating height. It’s beholding a place you’ve never had the good pleasure of treading over before yourself and taking that first step in. It’s the first time you walked down a street in a foreign country and observed the locals chattering incessantly, and their laughter brought you an indescribable joy. It’s the face of a stranger and how they smiled at you because no shared tongue could bridge the gap that verbal communication dug between you. Those incidents left their mark, but with permission from you, and you alone, will they begin to transform you too.

Travel transcends even the natural appreciations and perspective shifts that come about when you engage in your own explorations. For many of us, why travel whispers to the heart in the way that it does so compellingly is because it makes you feel alive in a way that nothing else can. To the void inside that has you wondering what you’re missing, give travel a try. Because longing for an adventure will disrupt your entire mundane world. Maybe you can’t quite put a finger on why you feel a little empty. But, once the recognized fever for travel takes over, if not remedied soon, misery can find its foothold. You see, you have awakened a natural desire that was only sleeping deep inside.

Perhaps this is for the already adventurous spirit and the ever-wandering heart, even to those acutely aware that there’s a whole wide world of cultures and countries just waiting for them to explore with arms wide open. Yet, it still stands to reason that adventure as an idea when sparked by the imagination soon takes root and produces a nearly indescribable yearning. Was that yearning birthed anew or was something laying dormant from within actually awakened after being buried by the world and its modern ideals of “how things should be?” Was there actually an innate sensitivity to travel excited by the hope of a future prospect named adventure?

Yes, travel is no new notion to mankind, but one that has consistently motivated us since the world’s beginnings. Expedition after expedition and migration after migration searching out other peoples and places has left almost none of the known world unchartered. Be it out of necessity, or some uncategorized instinct, clearly there’s something stitched into our makeup that drives us to experience more – to see, discover, and to understand. We crave it, curiously pushing the boundaries of the physical world. We seek it, constantly trying to make a connection to something or someone. Simply put, the stirrings of the heart that adventure evokes are the doorway to making those connections we so desire as human beings.

Why travel whispers to the heart so passionately possibly possesses an explanation, and yet it still seems to remain so completely inexplicable. And really all we may know is that something from deep down within has been made to feel alive. Hopeful. Bright. And spurred onward. So why travel whispers to the heart in the way that it does is perhaps exactly that – a whisper to the heart.

*Thanks for listening. Undoubtedly travel is something we feel very passionately about. Please, get to know who we at The Ever Wandering are a little better or feel free to leave us a comment or send us a message.