Why Travelling Light Is the Secret to Any Successful Journey.
On my first trip to Italy with my husband, he made me a very tempting proposition — travel with hand luggage only, and you can shop on the other side.
My usual modus operandi when it comes to travel is the ‘but what if’ mentality. What if it’s cold, what if it’s warm, what if I need these shoes for a fancy dinner?
This results in a giant suitcase that adds at least an hour to the commute on either side. One small carry-on bag each meant a quicker check-in and no baggage reclaim.
My husband likes to simplify things and enjoys creating permanent solutions, so this was one way to change my supersize luggage behaviour.
The truth is you never need as much as you anticipate you will, and you can quite comfortably manage with fewer well-chosen items.
Covid has limited my travel plans for the foreseeable future. However, I am adopting this principle of lighter baggage as I travel into the milestone of my forties in August.
I will leave behind all unnecessary baggage, such as the anxious ‘what if's, self-sabotaging habits, limiting thoughts, and patterns that will only hold me back. I want to put the most practical tools in my suitcase for the journey ahead. Here are the five nuggets of wisdom I have chosen to take with me on my journey into my forties:
Your life changes the moment you begin to believe in yourself.
‘Once you believe in yourself, it doesn’t really matter what other people think.’ — Marissa Peer
There is a fundamental shift that happens the moment you decide to believe in yourself. As a professional speaker and coach, I was in a pattern of treating every new talk or workshop as another opportunity to seek external approval to validate my sense of self-worth.
I always received positive feedback, but it triggered a negative pattern. As a perfectionist, I believed that the only way to achieve this success was by over-preparing.
It became a comfort behaviour; to excel, I must spend hours preparing for something I had done hundreds of times before. It wasn’t responsible preparation; it was overboard, yet it gave me the false permission I needed.
The moment I inherently believed in myself, I dropped this habit. Of course, I spend time customising and reviewing my work but with excitement about how I can contribute, no longer in the sense of fear of being perfect and worrying about what other people will think of me.
To adopt this mindset for yourself, reflect on your past wins and take the compliments you receive to heart. Do not fob them off and think they are said out of politeness. Internalise what you have achieved and permit yourself to have the audacity to believe in yourself.
You will not believe the freedom and energy it brings.
Waking up early is the greatest gift you can give yourself.
As a working mother of two kids, the greatest gift I can offer myself is solitude — time alone to check in with myself and figure out what I’m thinking. Sometimes I don’t know what is bothering me until I write it in my journal.
I use my power-nour (now hour) of 5 am to 6 am to do yoga, meditate, and journal. I feel like it is the equivalent of plugging my phone into the charger. It is my way to power my internal battery each day, and it allows me to put myself into a peak state and not get triggered by other people’s urgencies.
Mornings work because they unfold in more predictable ways, and there are no distractions.
If the morning feels like a difficult time, then perhaps you need to stop binge-watching Netflix till 11 pm and go to sleep an hour earlier?
Most people want to stay up late because it provides a sense of power and control over the day. But what if you replaced the need to watch T.V. with focusing on yourself?
You are not losing T.V. time; you are gaining so much more. In his book Drive, Dan Pink said we need three factors to be motivated: autonomy, mastery, and purpose.
Autonomy is the desire to have control over your world. By creating space for solitude, you gain clarity and the opportunity to dictate how you want your first hour of the day to unfold. The alternative is to default to checking your phone first thing and reacting to other people’s urgencies.
Mastery is the desire to improve at something that matters continually. When you create space in the morning, you can create your own life curriculum. Do you want to learn a new skill, watch a T.E.D talk, or study? The morning is an open platform to give you the time for this — distraction-free.
Purpose — this is about spending time on something greater than yourself. Most people struggle with knowing their purpose. It doesn’t need to be the ultimate reason you are on this planet, but what are you curious about? What matters to you? If you don’t know, spend some quiet time journaling and reflecting to find the answers.
Purpose is equally about contribution and adding value to others. Each morning, sit quietly and ask yourself:
How can I be a contribution today?
It doesn’t have to be a huge action; perhaps it’s calling a family member or friend you haven't spoken to in a while?
When you make your day about contribution, you can begin to show up as your authentic self and not your perfect self.
Surrender and acceptance are your best travel buddies.
Surrender and acceptance are your two most incredible friends. Like best friends, they don’t always tell you what you want to hear but what you need to hear, and they always have your best interest at heart.
The biggest lesson in my thirties is when life happens, the sooner you accept the situation for what it is, the sooner you find inner peace. There is a difference between pain and suffering.
Pain is what happens to us, for example, an illness or an unexpected challenge. Suffering happens when you feel helpless that you cannot control the situation.
Acceptance and surrender do not mean weakness, or you shouldn’t take action. It is accepting you may not be able to change the external situation, but your power lies in understanding you have the choice to manage your internal world.
When my kids moved to online learning, I resisted the situation because I had created a perfect schedule of how the day should go. By day three of feeling so frustrated that it wasn’t going according to my perfect plan, I had to surrender to it.
I had to embrace empathy and understand how the situation affected them and how I impacted my family negatively. The moment I accepted it and found a new way to approach it, the happier I became. You know what they say “Happy Wife = Happy Life”.
Acceptance means you cannot always control the situation. You can plan as best you can, but sometimes all you can do in the moment is to control your breath. That at least gives you the power of choice to insert a mental pause button to allow you to respond rather than react.
Give yourself permission to change your mind.
We form beliefs at various life stages, which makes sense at the time. When your circumstances change, your beliefs may no longer fit or completely contradict what matters to you now.
It is essential to permit yourself to let go of the old beliefs and change your mind.
You are not a hypocrite; you have grown and evolved as a person. Your values and priorities have shifted, which is a normal part of life.
Covid has indeed forced us to reevaluate what matters. When you feel an internal conflict, ask yourself if this belief still makes sense in your life?
If not, do not have an internal tug of war and identity crisis. Allow yourself to change your mind in line with the person you are now and move forward.
Unconditional self-love and acceptance are the foundations of a happy life.
Nike coined the phrase ‘Just Do It,’ but I have an updated version.
Just Do The Right Thing.
When you just do the right thing, it enables you to make the best choice for yourself in the moment.
‘Just do it’ could push you further into a pattern you are trying to break — just get the glass of wine, just miss the walk, just watch one more cat video, just check one more social media feed.
But just do the right thing interrupts that pattern and enables you to choose the option in your own best interest.
If unconditional self-love is daunting, how about adopting an attitude of unconditional friendliness towards yourself? If you consider your best friend, what are the traits you admire in them?
They are supportive, friendly, kind, unconditional, and non-judgemental. Can you bring a little more of these qualities to yourself? When you are sick, allow yourself to rest and recover. When you can feel your head pounding, take a break and get a glass of water.
When you just do the right thing, you keep the promises you make to yourself, which is how you develop true self-confidence. Your self-worth is demonstrated by the actions you take. When you do the right thing, you show yourself you are worth it, and you are enough.
When you just do it, and this behaviour sabotages you, then no wonder your narrative is how you can’t trust yourself or are not enough.
It’s easy to do the easy thing. It’s hard to do the hard thing.
Final thoughts.
I look forward to writing this article at age 49 and seeing what new concepts I have adopted and what I have chosen to let go of for the next chapter.
I hope this article has inspired you to consider what you can let go of and not carry unnecessary baggage into your next chapter.
Why wait for the next milestone? What can you ditch today to make your journey more enjoyable?
Maybe it’s about adopting some new ways of being to lighten your load:
Your life changes the moment you begin to believe in yourself.
Waking up early is the greatest gift you can give yourself.
Surrender and acceptance are your new best friends.
Give yourself permission to change your mind.
Unconditional self-love and acceptance are the foundations of a happy life.
Here’s to packing light so you can fill up the next suitcase with something even better.
Warm wishes
Lori