How to know yourself-58: Travel-Buddy

Travel, Companionship, and Knowing Yourself on the Road

• Who do you most enjoy traveling with?
• If time and circumstances allowed, who would you want by your side on every trip?
• Why do you feel good traveling with this person? What do you enjoy sharing with them?
• What does travel mean to you? Why do you travel — is it to relax, to explore, or something else entirely?
• How often would you like to travel each year?
• How often do you travel right now?

As the summer season arrives, vacation requests are in, and everyone is on the move — to unwind, to escape stress, to spend time with loved ones. And yet here I am, ready to disrupt this comfort and nudge you into reflecting on even this moment.

As someone who loves traveling alone, I find that first question especially meaningful. One reason I prefer solo travel is because it allows me to experience places not like a visitor in a zoo or museum, but as a participant in local life — blending in, connecting with people, and sometimes learning about the culture directly from them without setting foot in a single tourist attraction. Traveling solo also makes it easier to meet like-minded travelers, to learn from them about their cities, their cultures, their perspectives, and sometimes even add — or remove — places from my own list based on these conversations.

Of course, solo travel isn’t for everyone. Some people don’t know what to do with themselves when alone; they crave someone to share the moment with, or they fear being alone throughout the journey, equating solo travel with isolation. What they don’t realize is how much they might actually be missing out on.

When you don’t travel alone, you inevitably become a bit more closed off. My preference for traveling with someone hinges on mutual compatibility — not necessarily shared interests, but shared rhythms. The ideal travel companion is someone with whom I can occasionally go separate ways to pursue individual interests and then come back together to share experiences. With the right companion, it becomes easier to discover a wide range of things: culture, entertainment, nature. With the wrong companion, however, a vacation can quickly turn into a nightmare.

We’ve talked before about why we travel — in fact, I wrote two blog posts on this: Why Travel and Why Not Travel.

Defining your purpose for travel helps you feel better during the journey, plan more effectively, budget wisely, and most importantly, because you know what you enjoy (and what you don’t), it gives you peace of mind whether you’re traveling alone or with others.

For me, travel isn’t about lounging on the beach and spending every day the same way. It’s about reading more, writing more, and collecting lived experiences. That’s why I might spend a maximum of two days in a luxury hotel — it’s not my focus.

“How often would you like to travel in a year?” is also an interesting question. The answer depends on your travel purpose. For me, the ideal answer is: as often as possible. I even try to use weekends for short trips.

Today, travel has become trendy — almost a lifestyle people aspire to. Many say, “I’m going to travel the world,” because everything looks so perfect on social media. But the reality is quite different. For instance, there’s something called “traveler’s depression” — a period of doubt or sadness that can hit at the start or midway through a long journey. Even if you’re confident in yourself, it’s not uncommon to ask: What am I doing? What’s my purpose? It’s also normal to experience frustrations along the way, to occasionally miss home, and to feel like you’ll never return, or that when you do, nothing will be the same. (In truth, things usually stay the same — but those who see and experience, those who ask questions, those who learn and those who don’t are never the same.)

That’s why it’s important to get to know yourself in the context of travel as well. How many days can you handle, both financially and emotionally? Is it easy for you to be alone? Can you manage constant movement? Do you prefer a tightly planned, busy itinerary or a loose, flexible one? How do you respond when things go wrong? How far do you really want to go if your main goal is just to swim in the sea? Would you rather stay in a hotel, hostel, or guesthouse? What’s your preferred mode of transportation — car, train, or plane?

Asking yourself these kinds of questions can help improve your travel quality immensely.