A Tale of Two Journeys: Processing Emotions in Paris and Embracing Life in Ecuador

What if the path to healing and self-discovery lay not in monumental changes but in the simple act of slowing down? Join me as I recount my journey of finding peace in the charming streets of Paris and the comforting company of old friends in Strasbourg, following a personal upheaval. These experiences in France offered a refreshing antidote to the chaos, allowing me to process my emotions with a newfound lightness. The episode takes you through my enriching adventure in Ecuador, where the diverse landscapes and cultural contrasts—like the intricate art of Panama hat-making—invited me to embrace new experiences at a more mindful pace.

Through the lens of slow travel, I invite you to reflect on how stepping away from the familiar can be a therapeutic escape. This episode isn't just about my travels; it's an invitation for listeners to engage with their own travel experiences and share their stories. As we wrap up this reflective journey, I look forward to our next episode, where a friend will join us to share her captivating experiences of living in Japan. Together, we'll uncover more stories of adaptation and cultural discovery. Let's keep the conversation going, and may your own travels bring you the same sense of peace and rejuvenation.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Slow Travel
• 10:21 Personal Reflections on Travel Experiences

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:07

Welcome back to the Slow Travel Diaries. Thanks for joining me this week. In the last episode we dove deep with mindset coach Emily Pennystone about how travel can help us heal and find closure from the past. If you haven't checked it out, please go, do that, you'll love it. Today I want to share some of my own slow travel experiences that reflect those same themes of healing and self-discovery. And, as a little sneak peek, next time I will be talking with a dear friend of mine who has been living in Tokyo for years and we'll explore what it's like to adapt to a different culture and language. But first let's dive into my story. So we talked a little bit about this last time with Emily.

Speaker 1: 0:48

But one of my specific travel experiences that has to do with healing was after my divorce. I really needed to kind of get away and clear my head and kind of refocus and deal with kind of the sadness and the grief and the betrayal and all of those feelings that I was dealing with. And France has always been a place for me that has been kind of like I don't know. It fills my soul, it makes me feel calm, grounded. So I said, you know what? I'm going to Paris, I'm going for a week and I went to Paris and then I went up to Strasbourg and saw some of my good friends that were up there and I really had no plans for this trip. I just needed to go to Paris and so I booked my hotel and I got on a plane and, um, when I landed, I got off the plane and I was walking through the airport in Paris and just hearing the language and, and you know, seeing the different, um, familiar sights and smells and sounds, it automatically started to calm me down. Um, and uh, even taking, you know, even taking the train into the city and, you know, getting to my hotel, um, I don't know, it was just something about just kind of being in a different space. It was a familiar space, but different, um, just calmer.

Speaker 1: 2:33

And I got into my hotel and I basically immediately fell asleep and woke up and said, okay, I got, I'm just going to go get something to eat. And I just walked down the street, went into this little bistro cafe, had a wonderful meal, glass of wine, came back, took a shower, went back to sleep and it was. You know, it's just like it's what I needed to do. My body just needed this. It needed to just not have any set schedule, any set time. Not have any set schedule, any set time. It just needed to rest and not worry about anything.

Speaker 1: 3:23

And yeah, so this trip I just basically just kind of, you know, wandered around. I went to bakeries and I went to shops that I loved and I went to, you know, look at, you know, streets that had markets and things that you know I had always wanted to go visit. And, yeah, it was, it was very calming and and then I went up to visit. At the end of the trip I went up to visit, um, a friend of mine up in Strasburg, and it was good just to be, you know, with friends in a place that I had lived and um, to be able to talk with her about what had happened and how I was feeling and all that kind of stuff. It was very cathartic and and her mom had given her like some leftovers um to give in, to give me to have at her apartment and the whole thing was just very um, yeah, I guess the only word is healing. It felt very healing, I felt lighter, I didn't feel as heavy, um, and you know, I came back from that trip and I felt like, okay, I'm okay, I'm going to be able to get through this, I'm going to move forward and it's going to be fine. So it was, that trip was really, really important. Um, and then the.

Speaker 1: 5:14

The next thing I wanted to talk about was just how, traveling slower, when I was studying in France, who's from Ecuador, and I went to visit him and his family and you know he took me all around. He wanted to show me, you know, as much as he could. We went to, you know, the beaches and we went to the rainforest and we went, you know, as much as he could. We went to, you know, the beaches and we went to the rainforest and we went, you know, to the city and it was amazing, um, and just to, to, to kind of understand the dichotomy of, of, of that country and the different economic, socioeconomic things, the different socioeconomic things, the food culture there, you know the difference between the city and the beaches and the. You know we went to see salt flats and we went to the rainforest and we went up into the Andes and we went to this restaurant that you know had it served trout, because the rivers up in that high in the Andes could sustain trout, which was amazing. We went to up in the Andes.

Speaker 1: 6:17

We went to a little town that you know is where they make Panama hats which are actually not from Panama. They're from Ecuador hats which are actually not from Panama, they're from Ecuador and, um, they were just worn a lot when they were building the Panama canal, um, which was really interesting to learn. Um, got to see how they actually make the hats, how they weave the um, the reeds, the grasses, um, and you know, got to get actually like fitted and um, it was amazing, uh, going to the, the. You know got to get actually like fitted and it was amazing going to the you know the little markets and the fact that you know, the Native peoples are much, much taller than them. So it was very interesting and thankfully I had my friend. I don't speak much Spanish but I had my friend. I don't speak much Spanish, but I had my friend, and it's very interesting to be in that situation and to really absorb, be kind of in a very local place.

Speaker 1: 7:23

It was amazing, um, so that was one of those those times where, um, yeah, just slowing down and kind of taking the time to to absorb it all in, and I remember we went to this place for dinner and, um, I said to my friend I, I really love the pottery that they're using, the plates and the bowls and stuff that they were using at this restaurant. And I said I wonder if these are from here, if these are made locally, and without me knowing he had asked our waiter about this pottery and and he didn't say anything to me about it. And when we were leaving he said, okay, I want to take this little detour, I want to. There's something I want to show you. I said Okay, and we pull into this little, I don't know, it was like a little storefront and I said, where are we? And he's like, just wait a second. We go inside and he's like this is the place that made the pottery from the place that we had dinner. I said no way. So I, I actually was able to buy some pottery from the place that we had had dinner, which was is such a treasure that I have that. So it's.

Speaker 1: 8:52

It's it's like these things that you know, if you, if you're vocal about things that you like, if you ask questions, if you're open to experiencing things, um, these crazy wonderful things can happen and you have just wonderful memories for the rest of your life, and so that's why I just think that this is such a great thing. This kind of segues into my conversation with my friend next week. This idea of immersing yourself in a new culture and truly appreciating its traditions is something that she has found while living in Tokyo, and it's given her a new lens on valuing these traditions, these arts, these crafts and also understanding. You know how navigating through language barriers and cultural differences is really important and also a struggle, so I'm really excited to to talk with her. Have you guys listen to us about that?

Speaker 1: 10:21

I'd also love to hear from you guys in the comments, you know, if you've had any kinds of experiences like this, if you're excited to have experiences like this, if this is something that interests you, if this is something that scares you. I would really love to know how you guys feel about this, if this is something you're really interested in, if we want to talk about more on this. How you guys feel about this is something you're really interested in, if we want to talk about more on this. So I will leave it there and I hope you guys have a great week and hope to have you catch us next week when we talk to my friend about her experience in Japan.