What's Your Excuse For Not Going?

“Twenty years from now you will be more dis appointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So, throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. Let us live so that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.” — MARK TWAIN

Despite the amazing life-enhancing benefits of travel, only 36 percent of Americans hold a valid passport, according to the State Department, compared to 60 percent of Canadians and 75 percent for Brits and Aussies. That means almost 70 percent of American’s are unqualified for international travel. While there are plenty of amazing places to visit in the USA, it’s pretty short on medieval castles, marble cathedrals and stadiums built before Christ!

Nothing improves your creativity, worldview and understanding like travel as you enjoy:

• New places
• Cultures
• Food
• language
• History
• And most important of all friendships

I travel three to five months a year and have done every year since I was eighteen, forty years ago. Most of my friends are willing to hook up with me for a few days but seldom do they manage more. I have noticed that with a majority of people there is always an excuse for not being able to do anything for more than a few days perhaps even you… 

My 2021, 57 day golf, road trip around Spain and Portugal was epic :)

You’d love to travel but...

You can’t just up and leave right now because …

Your mother is 77 (she will ultimately die of a heart attack at 101 while trying to get in her 10,000 steps for the day)

You have a job (not a job you love or even like but heck it’s a job. In my early years, I simply quit each summer and got a new one when I came back. Then I was self-employed so I could do what I wanted. There are lots of jobs, in lots of places, you might even love some of them unlike the job you have now)

Your friends are all here (real friends will still be there when you come back, or like me even if you don’t co0me back. I’ve had the same four best friends since I was 12 and I live 3500 miles away, we still hook up every year)

You have a dog (there are kennels, dog sitters, and friends)

You have a car payment (sell it, trade it, buy it out, or walk away) debit is a ball and chain get rid of it!

You have stuff (storage, yard sale, give it away to friends or charity. Stuff is like barnacles on a boat all it does is slow you down.

You need to finish school (do you? I never finished high school or college and was a millionaire by 32)

You have a boyfriend or girlfriend (if the relationship is meant to be they will come with you or still be there when you come back. If not, there are plenty of fish in the sea)

Your spouse doesn’t want to go (great send them on a golf trip or a shopping trip or a week’s yoga retreat instead, you don’t have to do the same things!)

You don’t have enough money (Make it along the way, em…that’s interesting)

You can’t travel because of Covid (Could be true but I made it to 11 countries and 21 states in 2020, and 7 countries in 2021 you just have to pick and choose and be ready to go on green. There are also hundreds of great places in your own country you have never seen)

If people put a quarter of the effort into finding a solution that they put into coming up with reasons why they cannot do something they would have a lot more fun and adventure in their lives.

One thing I know for sure is that every great adventure in life starts with a YES!

What’s your excuse?