10 Reasons to Travel While You’re Young

Traveling is great at any age. And with time, most people do get to travel. But if you’re young, you might be wondering what to prioritize and what to put on hold. Studying and building friendships should have first priority for everyone in the 18-22 age group, but traveling must not be underrated, and there’s plenty to gain from traveling while you’re young. Get a bit of inspiration here!

It’s the best way to learn about the world

You can learn a lot from reading books and watching tv. But nothing beats the real thing, and nothing will teach you more about the world than traveling it.

Even if it’s just a single trip, for now, you can learn an endless amount of things. When you travel, you get the chance to dig into a culture, interact with it, and discover new things. Traveling is by far the best way to learn about the world. Even if it starts out as just a little corner of the world!

You will learn how to set a budget

Travel is expensive if you don’t know what you are doing. But if you plan ahead, and you make the right choices along the way, it can be somewhat affordable.

By traveling while you are young, you will certainly learn how to make a budget and how to follow it. If you don’t, well – it will have some clear consequences on your wallet and it may put your trip short. Assuming you’re not rich, you will have to be frugal, you will have to make choices based on what you can afford. Travel is often done within a budget, and by learning to make a budget and by sticking to it, you will prepare yourself very well for future financial challenges in life.

It will set you up for success

What does success in life have to do with travel? Quite a lot, actually!

Traveling lets you interact with strangers, typically in different languages than your own. It lets you face challenges that you are not used to. You might end up being stuck in a bus station in a small town. You might end up forgetting your suitcase in some Airbnb apartment and not be able to get it back for weeks. You might end up getting sick and having to deal with it on the go. Granted, these things don’t sound appealing, but when you can handle such situations, you grow tremendously as a person.

If you can go somewhere new alone and deal with new problems, you will notice how much easier everything is when you’re home. And facing adversity is the best thing you can do to get a success mindset later on.

It may put away notions of racism

When we live in our own countries, we only see life from one perspective. When we travel out into the world, or when we live in another country, we get to feel what it’s like to be away from home, to be a guest in another culture.

It has been seen many times that people lose notions of racism when they have tried traveling. When you get to interact with people from wildly different cultures, and you get to see their way of living up-close, it can take away misunderstandings and prejudices about them and their cultures. Oftentimes, you will find that people in other countries are incredibly friendly to foreigners – something most of us can learn from.

Travel gives you courage

If you travel alone, you surely learn how to be independent. Most young people today are very dependent on others – whether it is family, friends or authorities – so it makes sense to go out into the world alone and stand on your own feet. It forces you to take responsibility for yourself, it forces you to see who you are when you are completely on your own.

You don’t want to sit in a wheelchair one day and wish you hadn’t been a coward.

Meet friends for life

Most travelers don’t interact much with the locals. Avoid being one of them.

Try to meet new people when you travel. It can be locals or it can be other travelers. It’s easier than you would think. These days we get help from the internet where you can chat with people before going and end up meeting.

Aside from that, simply go to a bar and strike up some conversations. If you don’t drink, it doesn’t have to be in a bar. It can be while sitting in a park, while you’re in line in the supermarket, while you’re waiting for the metro or an entirely different situation. Talk to people, make friends, and some of them might just stick for life!

Learn other languages

If you’re into language learning, there is one thing that is super important to do: Travel!

Either to learn a new language or to apply the one you have already been learning.

In any case, if you’re a language lover, you’ve got to travel as well. Get going!

Travel brings gratitude

It’s quite amazing to have the opportunity to travel. Going back just a few generations, it wasn’t normal at all for people to travel – at least not the way we do it nowadays where middle-class people can easily enjoy several trips per year if they want to.

Overall, travel is something to be grateful for. And this gratitude can easily be felt when you’re on the road, seeing new places. It brings wonderful opportunities, it brings joy to life, and it is something we can easily feel thankful for when we are experiencing these moments.

When you’re young, you’re full of energy

When you’re old, you won’t be able to do as many things as when you were old.

So what happens to all the wild things that may happen on an active vacation? Well, don’t wait too long – try everything while you’re young!

As a young man or woman, you have the necessary energy to fully explore every place you visit. Take advantage of it, and don’t let your early twenties slip by.

You may want to stay forever

Some places can have such a big impression on us that we don’t ever want to leave it again. And some people actually choose to stay. If you really fall in love with a place and with its people, why not give it a chance? Other people have done it – completely without regret! You can always find a job somewhere, or perhaps become self-employed by making your own blog or vlog sharing your experience with others.

You’ll regret it if you don’t

Frankly, if you don’t travel when you’re young, you will regret it later. We’ve heard it so many times. Everyone who starts traveling a lot in the 30s or 40s, perhaps even later – they always come to think “hey, why didn’t I do this earlier? There weren’t really any valid excuses”.

Get out there and enjoy your life! Treat people with respect wherever you go, and be aware of your actions. Let go of the ego, see new places and lift your spirit. Travel will teach you who you are, and it will teach you about other people as well.