One year, five lessons

Shift your energy from protecting yourself from failure to squeezing the life out of life.” - Danielle Laporte

Happy International Women’s Day and Travelher anniversary!

So many fantastic and exciting things have happened in the year since we started Travelher. We simply wanted to provide a place of encouragement for women to travel - something we believe is important for endless reasons and in doing so, learned and reinforced some important and valuable lessons along the way.

1. The people with whom you surround yourself greatly impact your outlook on life.
When you share your goals and dreams with people who are close to you, magical things can happen. If your closest friends are excited and energised by the possibilities life has to offer, you begin to see everything in a positive light. And naturally, if your close circle is full of negativity and see the world as a cold and dark place, that is what it becomes.

2. Your energy flows where your attention goes.
By dedicating so much time and effort to the love and appreciation of travel, I ended up doing a lot of travel myself and saw some wanderlust dreams come to fruition. Additionally, with the focus on female empowerment, I was able to pinpoint some areas in my own life where I could be more supportive of other women and encourage others around me to do the same.

3. Being open to failure makes room for so much more.
The sheer amount of energy spent on trying to appear normal and within the context of societal-determined rules is exhausting. If you try new ideas and new ways of living, it is truly amazing what the results might be. Low key discomfort is much more dangerous than absolute misery - it allows people to convince themselves they don’t need to change when change feels a little bit scary.

4. Living a fulfilling and loving life is just as much about unlearning entrenched beliefs as it is about learning new ones.
Sometimes I am shocked about my own automatic thoughts on a situation. No matter how enlightened you think you are, it can be incredibly tough to untangle your mindset from what has been drilled into you since birth. When something like this comes to your attention, you must talk about it, address it and work at it because change can only start with you. When it comes to  female  empowerment, this is more important than ever. 

5. If you build it, they will come. But if you don’t really believe in it, they won’t stay.
Ideas are a dime a dozen but building them into something tangible is really expensive in many ways. Time consuming and challenging, they can take everything you have. If you don’t truly value an idea, it will be incredibly tough to maintain the sort of perseverance you need to realise its full potential. If you love it and believe in it, celebrate small wins and keep doing it. Under those conditions, something magical will develop. 

Wishing you all a sensational IWD2017.  #BeBoldforChange and spread the word x

Author - Meghan Advent

Meg is one of the co-creators of Travelher and lives and breathes travel. She recently left her full time office role to put more energy into her own projects.