healing journeys
To say that " traveling changes our lives " is almost a cliché, but there are cases in which it is chillingly true. So much so that we practically feel that the journey heals us, that it saves our lives. It happened to these travelers, who decided to embark on the adventure after a reverse of fate: breakups, duels, existential crises... On the way back, they were "cured", and they were never the same again.
BEFORE A DEPRESSION
"When my mother died , I fell into a deep depression for nine months, which caused the relationship with my partner to break up. After all that, I realized that things had to change, so, taking advantage of the fact that I had a good job and a lot of free time, I decided go to the airport every Friday and ask about all the flights leaving that afternoon and come back on Sunday. I compared prices and decided where to go. With this tactic I visited Istanbul, Paris, St. Petersburg, Rome, Naples, Athens, Prague... I went alone, without the intention of meeting anyone; I just wanted to visit the places, observe how people lived in them and reflect," recalls Nahúm, a film editor.
"That experience led me to think that I had to take a long trip to one of the places I had always wanted to visit, Morocco . So I armed myself with two backpacks and a camera and set out to cross the Atlas from north to south."
"Everything was going well until, in the middle of a desert mountain landscape, the bus I was traveling on overheated and stopped, a moment I took advantage of to get off and take photos. After a while, I realized that they had left without me, taking one of my suitcases".
"At that time, i thought i would die there : It was an inhospitable place where no trace of human life could be seen for miles around. In my desperation, while I was walking along that goat path where the bus had left, in the distance, in tears, I saw a goatherd."
The vertigo of getting lost in the Atlas
"I went up to him screaming and running like crazy. The guy, who only spoke Arabic, pulled out a knife but in the end, he understood that he needed help and offered me water. Afterwards, he took me to his house."
"It was an adobe house, with two rooms. In the front, he and his wife slept. In the back, the goats, his two children ... and I, who i stayed there three weeks . We managed to understand each other more or less through the daughter, who spoke some French."
"During that time, he accepted the food they gave me and I dedicated myself, with the children, to taking out the goats and climbing to the top of a tree that had a rock, looking at the desert".
"When those three weeks were over, the goatherd went to the village to sell the new goats that had been born. I went with him to continue my journey, and since I had nothing to pay him with, I gave him the hiking boots I was wearing. The guy burst into tears: it was a moment I will never forget".
"On my return, I discovered that everything that surrounds us in civilization was aggressive to me: the lights, the advertising posters, hearing the televisions through the windows... But, in addition to that collateral effect, that time in the desert went a long way, and I was finally able to figure out how I wanted to change my life -although later not everything turned out exactly as he had thought...-.
In a town like this, Nahúm resumed his journey
BEFORE A COUPLE CRISIS
"I went to Portugal this summer to find out if there would be a full stop or a full stop with my partner," says Marta, a journalist with two young children. "I decided to go to hotels that seemed almost like retreats (two old hospitals, one of them for tuberculosis) to be alone with my thoughts... and, in the end, they were full of children, nothing spiritual! However, although I did not It served to make the final decision, yes to rest, change the scene and focus on myself, even if it was for a tenth of a second".
BEFORE A RUPTURE
"I took a route through Indonesia after an intense breakup. It helped me to face the courage to be alone, to see the positive side of things and to understand that everything happens for a reason. And to understand that was at the beginning of a cycle of my life, not at the end," says Rhodelinda, a businesswoman.
"I was about to go to Italy with my partner at the time, but we left him and I went into a cathartic crisis, terrible," says Carmen. "At first, I thought of going to Italy alone, but I didn't feel like it, because it seems more like a country of enjoyment, like a Bertolucci movie: eating, drinking, enjoying being alive, and I wasn't in that mood, the So, watching YouTube videos of coaches and things like that, which was the only thing that saved me from depression, I ran into a girl who said that she went on a pilgrimage trip to Tibet. bulb, and I went to the Camino de Santiago for ten days, planning absolutely nothing. I bought a few things, took a backpack and left", he recalls.
"It was incredibly healing. I had a spiritual awakening thanks to which it seemed to me that everything made sense: I met the right people, who told me the right things. I discovered how little you can be happy. And what they always say: that getting to Santiago matters little: the road matters. I came back with a fairly strong faith, because, although many people go there without being believers, you talk to many people who are, either in a religious sense or in a spiritual sense. People from different cultures and different social classes, many of whom come after painful processes."
"You talk to these people, who in your environment you would not have a conversation with, and you share things that you normally would not talk about. And you see that, regardless of their beliefs, everyone suffers and everyone loves. In the end, I went from being a depressive cockroach when I went to love life again," he tells Traveler.es. "Y I used to be a lawyer, and now I'm an astrologer . It wasn't just the trip, but it did play a part!"
The Way changes everything
IN THE FACE OF AN EXISTENTIAL CRISIS
"I was bad with my boyfriend and with my life in general: I didn't feel good at work, I didn't cope well living away from my family... so I decided to go to Barcelona alone , with the excuse of visiting a friend," says Claudia, an English teacher.
"Since he was studying all day, I spent the day walking. I didn't do anything too touristy: I sat on a bench in the sun to smoke, I walked the streets of El Born seeing all the art that I had hidden in every corner, I spent hours in art galleries... One day, on one of those walks, I met two young French people who lived on the street . One of them, aged 21, was illiterate and did not speak any Spanish. The other was 26 and had been in a wheelchair for the last five years due to an accident in the army."
"We began to spend time together. We stayed in the street smoking or eating, we went to the beach to paint mandalas in the sand, we walked, we changed the coins they had for bills, and we communicated without even knowing each other's language".
"I felt it as a liberation: I was at peace, calm, although I knew that this situation would not last forever. However, I sensed that perhaps it would for them. That experience made me wonder if everything in my life was really so bad , and made me appreciate the little things of my day to day", recalls Claudia.
Get lost in El Born
TO CLOSE A PAINFUL CHAPTER
"I separated from my partner, but we had a trip planned to Lisbon and we decided to leave despite everything. For me, the feeling, which I associated with the city, was very bitter : It was a journey of love and heartbreak at the same time, of farewell. Time passed and I decided that I had to reconcile with the Portuguese capital, so there I went alone: I took my car, I planted myself in Lisbon, I found a hostel, and when I sat down to dinner in an Indian from the Barrio Alto who loved it, in which I had been with him the previous time, he gave me a anxiety crisis ", recalls Monica, photographer.
"That trip was very hard. The fears of traveling alone for the first time were added -I was about 24 years old- with having to face a place that had been recorded in my memory in an unpleasant way. I remember it as a very lonely week, but I did reconcile with the city - although it took me a lot of work, because I hadn't completely gotten over that breakup - it was difficult and painful, but it's the kind of thing that, although you know it will be difficult, you do because you also know it will be good for you in the long run. And it was."
BEFORE THE DEATH OF A LOVED ONE
"A few weeks after my father died, I went to the Leana spa in Fortuna (Murcia)," Silvia, a journalist, tells us. "The hotel is the first cousin of the Titanic (in fact, it was the favorite of President Antonio Maura) and the spa, a huge outdoor natural pool with panoramic views and Roman stone baths, are the opposite of chlorinated urban spas. I don't know if it was the hot springs, the lovely people (both guests and staff) or the feeling that the indifferent passage of time can also be kind... The thing is, for the first time, I felt something minimally comforting" .
AFTER AN ESPECIALLY STRESSING SEASON
Maria, a communicator, was also "cured" by the Camino. "She felt like I was drowning all the time, and I just visualized the idea of leaving things and people behind," she explains. To that feeling of hers was added a breakup, and a series of coincidences that finally led her to make that trip. "I had always wanted to do it, it was the typical experience that you have pending, but for which you never find that perfect moment, because it does not exist: How am I going to go to the Camino with how tired I am from the whole year? How am I going to go alone? How am I going to do it if I don't have time to train...?"
Reconcile with Lisbon
"A friend of mine had done it several times, and he told me that he when he was ill he did not go to the psychologist, he went to the Camino . A cousin had told me that he was going to be the best experience of my life , and I thought it was an exaggeration. But, to this day, he could say that yes, it was, although I suppose that more things will come in the future that will change that feeling, which I don't know very well to explain because I have it ".
"On the Camino, which I did for 13 days, everything fits together. Things are going to happen to you, good and bad, but, for every bad thing that happened (blisters, foot pain...), the way to solve it immediately appeared. super simple way. For example, the day I had the worst blisters, I met Angela, nurse, who is now a very good friend of mine . When I thought that it would not come because of the pain in my foot, there was another girl, a family doctor, who had the most wonderful anti-inflammatory in the world, thanks to which I was able to finish the Camino together with all the people I had met".
"You learn to trust. I'm not much of a mystic, but the Camino is putting you people and great things as you advance . I came back super happy and with a lot of energy, that feeling of leaving things behind was completely purifying. I remember that the day I went back to work, my colleagues told me: "Oh, poor thing, it's your turn." And I told him that nothing was poor, that I was super happy, that I had enjoyed it, I had done what I wanted and that my emotions had danced so much that I could only be happy and grateful. The Phoenix Bird thing, well, just like that: was reborn".
"Many of the things I learned during the Camino I continue to apply, such as what I have already mentioned about trust. When I start to get overwhelmed because I want to control everything and make everything fit together, in the end I stop and say: 'Look, it will come out how I have to. go out: trust". And you realize that later many things fit together. When I see that I can't handle something, I say: "Let's see, you have done 265 kilometers on foot, this is nothing'".
On the Camino, everything fits
"Thanks to the Camino, I have learned to realize how many times you put on brakes by yourself, and that, keeping a cool head, we are much stronger than we think. It has also helped me to gain perspective before stressing out, to remember to have time for others, even if it's to stop and give someone a direction, and for myself. It has taught me to enjoy the processes , to me, who usually obsesses me with the result and with whether I will be able to achieve it or not. On the Camino you realize that arriving is nothing. It's exciting, yes, because of course, you've done it, but it's literally a second. What matters is everything that has come before, and how you have enjoyed it."
BEFORE AN UNSATISFACTORY WORK
"I had a job that I didn't like, but the economic crisis and job insecurity led me to stagnate in it. Also, in my sentimental life, I was going through a time of difficulties that was consuming me. On a daily basis, I suffered from stress and anxiety due to the impossibility of changing a reality that I did not like. For this reason, I felt frustrated, empty and lost, because things were not turning out the way I wanted." Antonio, a biologist, tells it.
"I steeled myself and decided to leave everything: first my partner and then work, to focus on myself. I decided to leave three months to Costa Rica to volunteer with animals something I always wanted to do. This decision would change my life forever," she recalls.
"I got to know incredible places and people, I learned to trust myself and others more, I lived unique and unforgettable experiences, and it allowed me to get to know myself better. And as if that were not enough, volunteering with animals gave me the necessary experience to reinvent myself professionally. When I returned to Spain, I got a job in a Zoo!", he exclaims.
Costa Rica changes everything
Since that experience, six years have passed, during which Antonio has not stopped traveling: he has visited more than 20 countries, and has been so hooked on the experience that he has created a company, Viajes Existenciales, to offer the rest an experience equal as transformative as the one he experienced. "A trip changes you in many ways, if not in all. Especially when you move for months alone," he tells Traveler.es.
Going off a bike path and getting lost in a mountain -but finding wild and extraordinary places and being able to reach the destination-; trusting to leave all their belongings in a stranger's car to walk, on a layover, through Manhattan - and realizing that it is enough to "use common sense, open up and trust" to guide oneself through the world - were some of the experiences what did they do to him turn during that first adventure.
"Traveling expands you and enriches your mind by meeting new people, new cultures and new ideas, which allows you, at the same time, to know yourself better. In addition, you feel limitless You see yourself capable of anything by making a decision like this, and of course, you gain a lot of confidence in yourself and in others".