Reflection

22 August 2012

Traveling gives you many opportunities to reflect, renew and refocus on the journey ahead.

You gain the mental space to consider the experiences you have had so far in life and how they have impacted on the choices you have made.

When traveling you are presented with thousands of possible routes  - you make a choice and then enjoy the ride hoping that it will take you closer to the intended destination. You become acutely aware of the importance of the journey and how the experiences you have along the way create the real impetus  for personal reflection and change.

Here are some quotes on this theme. I hope you like them. Please visit Julie Griffin's web site who shared them with me: www. learningconservation.net

" Ain't you thinkin' what's it gonna be like when we get there? Ain't you scared it won't be nice like we thought?"

"No" she said, quickly. "No I ain't. You can't do that. I can't do that. It's too much - livin' too many lives up ahead. They's a thousan' lives we might live but when it comes it'll on'y be one"

Rosasharn and Ma, in Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck

"A journey does not need reason. Before long,it proves to be reason enough in itself. One thinks that one is going to make a journey, yet soon it is the journey that makes or unmakes you. "

Nicolas Bouvier ( translated from L'usage du monde)

" Life is never a straight forward journey. It takes you through quicksand and marshes, ditches and gullies, over high mountain passes and up and down steep slopes. It is such tough going that you sometimes feel like a climber with a heavy backpack pressing down on your shoulders, gasping for air. Then all of a sudden you come up to an easy road and you are able to relax and enjoy the scenery for a while"

The Silent Steppe, Mukhamet Shayakhmetov ( an autobiography by a Kazakh nomad)