Transformed by travel

What does travel do to you? Do you come back home a different person? Travel could be a spiritual experience that shakes off our usual certainties and connects us to a richer, vaster world. Says the renowned travel writer Pico Iyer, 'When you are in a foreign place, you can't define yourself as you used to. I always seek out places that overturn my assumptions and so send me back as a different person than the one who left home.' He adds that travel humbles and releases us, and gives the example of Prince Siddharth who left his gilded palace and confronted suffering, and reality. This led him to explore the spiritual path and he eventually became Gautama Buddha.

All of us may not have such an intensely transformative experience but, certainly, there are several positive benefits of travel, of getting out of your comfort zone and experiencing new people, cultures and geographies. When we are safe at home, we think we know what we need to know - until we step out into the wide world.

We get to see the intersection of cultures and faiths, traditions and languages. Curiously, as Iyer points out, many places of pilgrimage like Jerusalem and Iran are also places of intense conflict. Religion itself can cause suffering because of misunderstanding. Yet, these are places of unmatched beauty and very few would come away without being moved, no matter which faith they belong to. Despite the challenges, we can look for solutions and hope for peace in a spirit of surrender and love.