EA Radio Episode # 12 - The Not-So-Unintended Benefits Of Travel

Scott Stein, the owner of and travel planner for Extraordinary Adventures (//www.myextraordinaryadventures.com/travel-podcast.html), gets on his soapbox to preach about how important travel is and The Not-So-Unintended Benefits Of Travel.

Music: www.bensound.com

 

(The show transcript is being provided by YouTube's automatic transcriber. Please forgive any inaccuracies or errors.)

[Applause] [Music] hey everybody this is Scott much Jordan area ventures again and I'd like to welcome you to the twelfth episode of EA radio today I wanted to quickly discuss the health benefits of travel everyone knows that they love to travel it's wonderful it's fun it's it's you know something we all strive to do but have you really considered then it's not just would you call it a an optional thing I think that people overlook the significance of travel and leisure time rest and relaxation but I believe they are essential to our well-being in fact I'm gonna read something here according to a joint study from the global Commission on Aging and trans America Center for retirement studies in partnership with the US Travel Association traveling actually keeps you healthier the study found that women who vacation at least twice a year should was significantly lower risk suffering heart attack than those who only travel every six years or so the same is true for men men who do not take an annual vacation to a 20 percent higher risk of death a 30% greater risk of heart disease now I could go on pull more and more facts off the internet but you can do it yourself you can go to Google check it out left and right all of them page that the pages of data that's been compiled of how important not just going to sleep not just doing you know yoga those are awesome too but taking a vacation getting out of your typical routine your typical space I think that for me it really boils down to four personal things factors that I don't know that if I didn't travel if I if these things would be where they're at you know for me and I know that when I don't travel for a certain amount of time I definitely see these factors coming up so let me let me go to the first one I think the first and most obvious one is stressful we all work probably too hard most of us the American Way of life is to work too hard we give up so many vacation days every year we just change change them in for money we are the least vacationed Society first-class world society everyone else takes more vacations and thus everyone else has passports we have like I know 30% of Americans or something like that passports where is like you go to other countries in Europe bache they all do and they don't even need it to get from you know all those Schengen countries they can go all throughout the EU without them and yet they all have them they all travel there's a reason for that and they have figured something out I think that we haven't figured out and that is you got to get out of your space to unwind to to take the pent up stuff and get rid of it and I don't think you can do that just sitting at home I don't think you can do that go to the movies or going for a nature hike I think you need to get out so for me that's something that's that's a big one is that you know life life is beautiful wonderful I love it overall very happy guy but I have stress you know I'm a small business owner I have an aging dog who you know gives us a challenge too we love him he's been around 14 and a half years Albert in case you don't know some of you dude some you don't he's pretty amazing but it's stressful having an old dog and of course we have all just stresses that everyone else does money and paying the bills and all these things you need to get away from all that all of it even your lovely beloved dog you need to take yourself away for a couple weeks and and unwind but I also think for me the next one up is probably more important and I think I don't put these in order that one would be quote unquote the the lowest a priority item the next one would be happiness I don't believe in doing things just to remove pain I'm a person who likes to bring in pleasure joy so a lot of us do things to remove pain and that motivates us but the absence of pain is not joy you know what light exists darkness does not the absence of light is gives you darkness the absence of darkness doesn't give you light it's the same thing when you have an absence of joy you have pain but having an absence of pain doesn't give you joy so I find that for me Travel is a huge huge factor in my overall happiness and fulfillment in life whether that's you know the simple cruise getting away and just and just being in the islands and and relaxing and a hot tub and drinking pina coladas and stuff that counts I'm I love that stuff I if I could do that more often I would it doesn't have to be these these uh you know Patagonia trips or Iceland or or you know ancient Rome doesn't have to be anything too extraordinary even though the name of my company is extraordinary adventures what it just needs to be is getting away and and and having some fun dancing eating drinking being with friends so happiness is a huge one but I also think for me what's probably let me see I'm looking at these next two and Farah which one I think is is a the more important one and I'm gonna have to say perspective is coming next what do I mean by perspective so Laura and I have noted over the last several years that every time we get away we come back and we look at our life things in our life not necessarily the whole picture but things in it but also sometimes the whole picture and we look at me say wow that's that's not right what are we doing here we could be doing this better we could be doing that better we could we could change that something happens when you take your mind off of your own junk for a while you come back to it and you can see this was the same scene for the forest for the trees we we get too caught up in seeing all those little trees that when you back away you can look at the thing and say well this is working for me and this is not and I think you need to get away to be able to do that I think you need to take a vacation I think you need to travel and and also I think travel shows you and this one this one doesn't work so well with cruises it does go into other cultures when you when you go to you know South Africa and you get into the tribes if you go to to Asia and you meet them the monks when you look at other people's way of looking at the world it changes the way you look at the world and you can never come back from travel the same you will be a changed person and that will give you a new perspective on the things in your life for better force so perspective to me is a huge reason for why I travel but I think the single biggest reason for me for travel is the person is very driven in life you know I want to have a great relationship I want to have my dogs and my relationship with my dogs I want it to be great I ride a Harley I want that to be great I always push myself for greatness never for perfection you can never hit profession but for greatness be be good at what you're doing and just always strive to make it better but let me give you a quick analogy if any of you know Stephen Covey is one of the best motivational speaker writers of all time he had a great analogy about sawing down a tree guys walking through the woods comes upon a lumberjack who's sawing away sawing away sawing away and the guy says to him you know you look like that maybe that saw is a little bit too dull for the job that you're doing maybe you should take a break from that sharpen the saw and then go back and they'll make your work easier make your make your job lighter and the guys response was I don't have time to stop to sharpen the saw I'm too busy sawing that seems paradoxical doesn't it you can't slow down from sawing long enough to do something that will make your sawing easier lighter faster efficiency doesn't come from just going faster harder more over and over and over again you need to step back you sharpen that saw and then you need to go at it again so that's what I think that for me the vacation is probably the travel is probably the most important thing I believe that travel is good for your health is good for your mind it's good for your relationship but I believe that travel makes you better in your own life if you want to be better in your own life if you want your life to be the place that you want it to be you can't keep sitting in that bars and looking at those trees you've got to get out get some perspective change who you are be happy be strengthened stress have you stress reduced and sharpen that saw so that to me is why I say all the time I say that people over often overlook the significance of travel and leisure time but I believe they are essential to our well-being and as those are my reasons so that is our show for today I apologize for all the emails and and and phones and the dog barking and whining in the background we are here a home-based business and a home-based podcast so that's what happens when you are home-based and you don't have the editing power and money of a major podcasting corporation so hopefully as I continue to grow this will get better at cleaning some of that up the editing but ok that's all for today I hope you enjoyed today's show if you did or if you didn't either way email me at scott at my extraordinary adventures com tell me your first name where you're from and I'll give you a shout out on the air ok and of course don't forget to share this on your favorite social media outlet Facebook Twitter Linkedin wherever you like to do your social media ink but I will also tell you that from now on we are not gonna be doing our YouTube channel we are now doing a real podcast we are now listed on iTunes we're very fancy now so you can go like our Channel and you can go subscribe to it but I don't think there's gonna be anything more a new content going to our YouTube channel I will put a link in the show notes to the podcast that you can find it more easily downloaded to your your cell phone and your your I tuned player iPad I Mac wherever you do your eyes stuff and you'll be able to listen to it I think a lot more easily than the way I had it on the youtube so please spread the word tell everyone share that link with everyone and until next time again this is Scott from extraordinary adventures thanking you for tuning in and we will catch you on the next episode of e a raven stay tuned everybody shout [Music] you [Music]