Six Days for a Fifteen Hour Trip?

Make a vacation about the journey rather than the destination. How can you focus more on the journey and not just on the destination? To do this, these things may help: Decide you are interested in roadside attractions, take time to slow down and do more sight-seeing in life, and make a point every day of going the long way at least once.

I know someone who’s planning a trip to visit a friend. The trip will take two weeks, but she’ll only be spending four days with her friend. She’s going to take six days to drive one thousand miles, stay four days, and take six days to drive back.

You might be thinking this person drives really slow. She actually does like to take things very slow, drive only a few hours a day and stop a lot. But the reason she’s taking six days is to spend time alone, visit some areas of the country she’s never seen before, and really experience a vacation.

In fact, visiting the friend may just be an excuse to drive the 1000 miles. If she knew anyone in California, she’d probably be taking a month-long vacation.

I find this an interesting way of taking a vacation because I work with people to help them “Slow Down FAST.” Slowing down is what I do, and what I teach the people I mentor.

I like this idea of making the vacation about the journey rather than the destination.

I realize most of us don’t have the resources, or the desire, to take a two-week vacation this way. And we don’t need to.

What’s important about this little story is not the actual drive from one location to another, or the details of what she’s going to do on that trip, where she’ll stay, what she’ll see or how she’ll spend her time.

What I think is important is the willingness to take a little longer to reach a destination, and to really explore the world while doing so. I sometimes fall into the trap of wanting to “get somewhere” every time I start out on a journey.

Do you do this? When was the last time you just hopped in the car and went for a drive? When was the last time, in your life, you just spent some time alone, thinking about nothing in particular, doing nothing especially?

When was the last time you went to the library, wandered through the stacks, and picked up the first five books that looked interesting, no matter what section they were in? Did you read them?

Purpose and direction are very important in life. I’m a big believer in knowing where you’re going and why. But I also think that sometimes you just do something. You just do it because it’s there to do. You don’t have to climb Everest because it’s there, unless you want to, but why not take a long trip to nowhere once in a while?

How can you focus more on the journey and less on the destination? How can you make sure you’re taking time not just to stop and smell the roses, but to see them in the first place?

1. Decide you’re interested in the roadside attractions.
2. Take time to slow down and do more sight-seeing in life.
3. Make a point every day of going the long way at least once.

Thanks to Today is That Day for including this post in the Doing it Differently Blog Carnival.

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