Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is about how busy people can travel more. Even
Speaker 1: if you have a job and a family, it is
Speaker 1: possible to have at least a few travel adventures. The
Speaker 1: key is rethinking some common stories about what travel entails,
Speaker 1: so travel tends to feature prominently in people's memories. My
Speaker 1: guess is that you don't really remember a random week
Speaker 1: from six months ago all that well, but you might
Speaker 1: remember a week you spent in Yosemite National Parks six
Speaker 1: years ago quite vividly. Our brains have a tendency to
Speaker 1: pay attention to new experiences, which makes time seem more
Speaker 1: thick and rich. Of course, one reason travel produces memories
Speaker 1: is that we tend not to do it all that often,
Speaker 1: or if you do, it's often that you are flying
Speaker 1: to the same business location again and again, which may
Speaker 1: not be all that memorable either. By its nature, leisure
Speaker 1: travel won't be every day Travel tends to take time, effort,
Speaker 1: and money, all of which can feel in short supply
Speaker 1: during the busy years when people are building their careers
Speaker 1: and raising their families. It makes sense. But when I
Speaker 1: ask people what they'd like to spend more time doing,
Speaker 1: travel comes up a lot. When I suggest people make
Speaker 1: lists of one hundred dreams with their life goals, the
Speaker 1: first third is often the thirty three places people would
Speaker 1: most like to visit. So how can busy people travel more?
Speaker 1: I know there are a lot of practical tips out there,
Speaker 1: but in today's episode, I want to share two mindset
Speaker 1: shifts that help make travel in the busy years slightly
Speaker 1: more possible. The first is to get your head around
Speaker 1: the idea that even if you have a family, you
Speaker 1: don't need to do all your leisure travel with your family.
Speaker 1: In particular, you don't need to travel with your spouse. Now,
Speaker 1: I know, it is probably a lot more fun to
Speaker 1: travel with your other half. Maybe you have limited paid
Speaker 1: time off, it might seem wrong not to reserve that
Speaker 1: PTO to travel with your family or at least your
Speaker 1: significant other. But one of the big reasons people don't
Speaker 1: travel as much as they want is that they can't
Speaker 1: imagine bringing their kids to a certain place, or it
Speaker 1: would be a lot more expensive to travel with their kids,
Speaker 1: and they don't have coverage for those kids. Asking another
Speaker 1: family member to stay with your three young kids for
Speaker 1: five days is in fact a fairly big ask, But
Speaker 1: if you have a co parent, that person can easily
Speaker 1: be the coverage. You just obviously can't travel with him
Speaker 1: or her. If both parties are interested in traveling more
Speaker 1: but are stuck on the problem of paying to take
Speaker 1: kids somewhere they might not really appreciate, or the problem
Speaker 1: of finding overnight childcare, each parent could commit to covering
Speaker 1: for the other for the equivalent of two long weekends
Speaker 1: a year, or perhaps one week. The other party assumes
Speaker 1: all parenting responsibilities, knowing that the co parent will pay
Speaker 1: this back. The upside of this is that solo travel
Speaker 1: can be easier and certainly less expensive. It's only one flight,
Speaker 1: only one museum admission, only one meal at a restaurant.
Speaker 1: I know some people are wary of traveling solo, though,
Speaker 1: as a woman who has traveled by myself a reasonable amount,
Speaker 1: I can tell you that if you keep your wits
Speaker 1: about you, you're probably going to be fine. But if
Speaker 1: you think it won't be fun, get a friend to
Speaker 1: make the same arrangement with their spouse and travel together
Speaker 1: with your friend. Or in my family, my husband and
Speaker 1: I have both taken one of our older kids to
Speaker 1: cool places. If you've got a good relationship with your teens,
Speaker 1: they can be excellent travel companions while your spouse stays
Speaker 1: with your other kids. As for a limited PTO, this
Speaker 1: solo travel might not consume as many days off as
Speaker 1: you think. If you are strategic, If you've got a
Speaker 1: long weekend somewhere, you could take one extra day, leave
Speaker 1: on Thursday afternoon or evening and come back Monday night.
Speaker 1: That gives you at least three point five days somewhere.
Speaker 1: Some folks use leave strategically around a day like July fourth.
Speaker 1: It was a Thursday the year I am recording this,
Speaker 1: and a lot of offices were closed both Thursday and Friday.
Speaker 1: If you took one extra day, you could leave Tuesday
Speaker 1: night and come back Sunday night, scoring at least four
Speaker 1: point five days somewhere. In any case, in this spouse's
Speaker 1: trade off scenario, both of you might be happier getting
Speaker 1: to go somewhere you think is cool, versus both of
Speaker 1: you spending time and effort and money doing things you
Speaker 1: are less happy about. Just because you think it as
Speaker 1: a rule that everyone has to spend their days off together.
Speaker 1: It isn't If you change that mindset, all sorts of
Speaker 1: possibilities open up, and the second mindset shift you don't
Speaker 1: have to go somewhere for long for it to be fun. Yes,
Speaker 1: travel itself, as in the process of getting from point
Speaker 1: A to point B, is often not that enjoyable. It
Speaker 1: can be more of a necessary evil. But people tend
Speaker 1: to think that if they flew or drove all that way,
Speaker 1: they should stay a long time. The corollary of that
Speaker 1: is that if they can't stay a long time, it
Speaker 1: isn't worth it. I would encourage you to get rid
Speaker 1: of that story right now. The travel time is a
Speaker 1: sunk cost of going somewhere cool. It takes about seven
Speaker 1: hours to fly from Philadelphia to Paris, whether you go
Speaker 1: for fourteen days, four days, or zero days. If you
Speaker 1: can't go for fourteen days, that doesn't mean zero is
Speaker 1: the only other option. You can go to Paris for
Speaker 1: a long weekend. Even though it was a short trip,
Speaker 1: you'll still have been to Paris. Whereas if you decide
Speaker 1: all that flying is too much bother, then you won't.
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about every weekend, but going somewhere at
Speaker 1: least semi exotic twice a year well why not. Well,
Speaker 1: of course there is the cost, but as with the
Speaker 1: travel time, the getting there is somewhat of a set cost,
Speaker 1: however much time you spend there. Yes, it can be
Speaker 1: expensive to fly cool places, but if you can't fly
Speaker 1: there for a month, that doesn't mean you shouldn't go.
Speaker 1: I would also note that if you are flexible about
Speaker 1: where you go, you can often find some reasonable deals
Speaker 1: if you are looking. I was poking around online recently
Speaker 1: and found that flights to Dublin from Philadelphia were literally
Speaker 1: one thousand dollars cheaper than flights to Madrid for the
Speaker 1: same days. I am not sure why, but if your
Speaker 1: hope was to travel more and you are flexible about
Speaker 1: where you are going, that suggests letting the serendipity of
Speaker 1: the airline pricing system guide you. If you are traveling solo,
Speaker 1: that is probably not too hard to pull off. In
Speaker 1: any case. By letting go of the idea that you
Speaker 1: have to travel with your family or at least your spouse,
Speaker 1: and letting go of the idea that you have to
Speaker 1: travel for a long time to make it worthwhile, you
Speaker 1: can open up a lot more possibilities. Maybe in a
Speaker 1: perfect world you could spend two months a year traveling
Speaker 1: and always travel with your significant other. But the alternative
Speaker 1: to that isn't doing nothing. Do things a little differently,
Speaker 1: and you just might have some more travel in your future.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and
Speaker 1: here's to making the most of our time. Thanks for
Speaker 1: listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback,
Speaker 1: you can reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com.
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts
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