Travel Resolutions for 2023
As we welcome the new year in just a few short days, I wanted to highlight some of the travel resolutions that I think are noteworthy when preparing for a travel-filled 2023. Just a quick disclaimer, these are travel resolutions that I am prioritizing and I would love to hear if there are any more that you guys have that I can include for future posts. Feel free to leave me a comment and I will follow up with you about how I can incorporate that into my next post:) Shall we get started? Excited to fill your ideas with new travel resolutions for 2023 that will greatly impact your year, trust me!!
Travel Resolutions for 2023 #1: Travel With Someone You’re Compatible With
Travel resolutions for 2023 include prioritizing yourself and finding the people that you enjoy being around. Ask yourself this big question… are your travel personalities aligned? I know this might sound odd since you guys are already really close friends enough to be planning a trip but hear me out. Not every friend is a “travel friend” and hey that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Just because you’re friends with somebody and really close with somebody does not necessarily mean that they’re compatible with you on a trip. Basically here’s why. Your friends are people you’ve met with throughout your life at school extracurriculars even through mutual friends and parties and you have a lot of things in common, but there are some differences that you want to look out for before you book a trip and spend a lot of money on it.
Examples to Consider
- Think about this: So you love to go skiing and you’re planning a trip out west to some of the best ski resorts in the world. You are not necessarily going to think about your friend that doesn’t like skiing on the trip right? I mean that’s just common sense because you don’t want your friend who doesn’t like Skiing to feel out of place when that’s the main activity to do there.
- Now also think about it like this. Say you are going out to a restaurant and you really want tacos and you find out that your friend really dislikes tacos. It’s not that they’re just not in the mood for tacos, they just don’t like them at all. Well, it’s going to be very hard to travel with that person in countries where that’s the predominant food. They might wanna end up going to only fast-food chains and other restaurants and not really experienced a local cuisine and that’s something that you need to consider.
So these are actually a few examples and trust me there are so many others that I can think of but to cut to the chase, you want to make sure that your travel personalities are aligned. My closest friends are not people that I necessarily want to go on those extreme adventures with because I just know they don’t enjoy those things and that’s totally okay. I love them for who they are and I don’t want them to change at all! It’s nothing personal and as long as you are mature and your friends are too, it should never get in the way of a friendship.
Other Components to Consider
I also think about how experienced the individual I’m traveling with is. If this is their first trip aside from their family, I’m going to be a little bit concerned because they don’t really know how traveling is going to go and haven’t really developed those skills that I mentioned earlier. Another thing I look at is their backgrounds. Are they passionate, energetic, and driven toward creating an itinerary with me? Are they someone that prefers to go to fast food restaurants instead of authentic locations? Do they value brands and tangible objects over experiences? Were they somebody that had everything handed to them growing up and didn’t necessarily work for it? Are they someone who complains a lot? Does this person look at the bright side and resort to positivity when things go wrong?
Now, these are just a few questions that I have to myself when I am planning a trip with somebody, and the list grows and grows each time I travel with someone. When I urge you to seriously consider these questions, seriously consider them. You do not wanna go on a trip with somebody that doesn’t have the same travel personality as you and or someone that you feel isn’t truly compatible with you.
How My Family Ruined Traveling For Me Moving Forward
So by the sound of this headline, I know that it’s coming off wrong, but my family truly ruined travel for me. Growing up, I have gone on a lot of trips with my family and I’m very fortunate for those experiences. I was taught that on the trip you maximize your experiences. It is a privilege and a luxury to visit a place and spending most of that time relaxing has never been a priority for us because we want to learn as much as we can about the destination we are visiting. Based on this and my upbringing throughout my family travels, I am someone who wants to do EVERYTHING.
I mean like my family wakes up at 4 AM to go on hikes, we explore local areas of whichever location we are traveling to at the time and maximize the hell out of the trip. It’s almost a blessing and a curse that I grew up this way because I have not been able to find somebody who has the same travel personality as me, unfortunately. It’s why my family vacations are truly the BEST & why I really can’t go on a vacation with anyone else. I am extremely energetic, I don’t require a lot of sleep, I’m very enthusiastic and I just want to maximize the trip as much as possible- like every person in my family.
I’ve learned to be flexible, open to change, and adaptable, which has allowed me to move quickly on my feet, and those are some traits people still need to learn. It becomes a conflict when your travel personalities are not so aligned with the people that you’re traveling with.
I Love My Family
With that said, I love my family to death and I’m grateful that I have my family to go on these trips with. I feel as though I can be myself without getting worried about making someone feel tired or catering to someone else’s needs because I know that my family is always down and I mean always down. They ruined travel with me for anyone else but them since we all have the same travel personality traits
That’s something that I’m trying to convey to my listeners, readers, and followers. I believe a fulfilling travel experience is being open to change and having that “always down“ mindset. If you close yourself in on just doing things you’re used to, you’re never getting out of your comfort zone, you’re never experiencing things from a new lens, and because of that, you could be experiencing so much more out of a trip than you are already. Now being “always down” does it mean to do the extreme things but it just means to be a little bit more flexible and adaptable while on a trip, which is something a lot of people I’ve traveled with have struggled with.
My Travel Personality & My Hamartia
To preface this, a hamartia is a fatal flaw. It’s a quality of yours that is detrimental at times. Now I have already alluded to some aspects of my travel personality, but it’s really important to know that everyone is evolving after each trip. After each adventure, you learn things that you like about travel companions, things that you’re searching for, attributes that you wish to develop, attributes that you want to gain, and so on. To add on to that, I know that travel is a non-stop continuum of improvement, self-development, personal realization, and just an appreciation for the world around you from a different perspective.
Most of you guys already know my personality. I’m very bold, confident, energetic, adaptable, flexible, and extremist, and basically, those are attributes of my travel personality. I might be losing some people on this TikTok reference, but in a TikTok, Lady Gaga says “all right let’s go to a club, another club, another club, another club, no sleep, no sleep” and if you know me you know I have so much energy that I don’t get tired easily and it’s exhausting trying to find people that meld my travel personality.
To Be Honest
I’m going to be completely honest with you it’s upsetting sometimes because I feel like I can’t always be myself on a trip because I have to accommodate others and of course, I want to do that I want both parties to be happy, but I don’t feel like I’m fully expressing myself to the utmost capacity that I know I can on a trip. I feel as though there’s some type of imposter syndrome hitting in where I have to play myself down in order and be over-accommodating to kind of fit into my environment. It’s almost part of the reason why one of my goals also this upcoming year is to go on a solo trip.
I just think about how I’m very go with the flow and I have an open mindset I think I would thrive in that kind of environment. I know as a young female, it’s very intimidating to travel solo, but something else you should know about me I’m fearless and unstoppable.
Travel Resolutions for 2023 #2. Travel Companions: KEEP THEM FOREVER
Now another resolution I have is once I find a travel companion with whom I am completely compatible I never let them go. Like I refuse to. I think it’s really helpful when you have two people that are very similar that you can grow with and bond with and learn from and I think I’m still searching for that which is a part of this process that I’m going through. I’m kind of just documenting it so that you guys too can work on that as well because once you get down the line and once you get older it’s gonna be that much harder to find those people.
I mean when you think about it I’m just a young 22-year-old woman, but in about five years I’m gonna be 27 and there are some big trips I want to do in the future and I want to bring people along with me that I get along with really well on a trip and that might vary trip to trip, but in my head when I find that person I am going to keep them forever and ever and ever.
Travel Resolutions for 2023 #3: Change Your Mindset: Money Can Wait Experiences Can’t
I think this headline in itself it’s a big reason why I have the “always down” mindset because experiences are sometimes once in a lifetime and your income can wait. I think that a part of why I like to live in the moment is because I know that nothing is guaranteed and you will never really know until you try something. With everything going on with the pandemic and things happening so quickly, it has turned me into someone who thinks vicariously. I already did my part and waited years before going on a trip and I think it’s time for us to take a step back and realize that if we keep prolonging these experiences these trips for us we’re going to be in this endless cycle of postponement.
The best thing that we can do is to continue to be safe and take the necessary precautions to make sure that we are doing the right thing. In terms of COVID, I recently wrote a guide and everything I need to know about it from a timeline of how COVID started to resources in vaccine information, and even how it is affecting traveling now so if that is something that interests you and you want to read a little bit more about that feel free to click the link right here.
Can Money Wait Though? Why a Travel Budget-Friendly Lifestyle Is Your BFF in 2023 (Travel Resolutions for 2023 #4:)
Now to be clear your income cannot exactly wait. You still need to pay the bills and other living expenses. That is why for this upcoming new year I am going to seriously budget my life. Even though I wrote this part last year, it is still a goal of mine for 2023. I went through a crazy spending spree and I think it’s time that I need to relax a little bit maybe you guys have been feeling that too so we can all do this together.
For myself, I worked really hard to get where I am today and I think it’s a testament to my work ethic all throughout high school, college, and grad school that I’m able to have these experiences because it’s a long time coming: however, this tendency to spend and spend and spend doesn’t really justify itself. I am not really thinking about where all that money is coming from and I want to make sure that I am maximizing my experiences and that really starts from maximizing how strictly I can follow a budget.
Aside from rent and other necessary expenses, I really want to lessen my monthly expenses tenfold and continue to find other streams of income as well. There are so many resources to find other opportunities to work such as Upwork which is a website that is for Freelancers and can help you navigate those additional income streams. I have a few opportunities under my belt, so once I feel really secure I’m going to take that into consideration into my budget as well.
Learn That IT’S OKAY TO SAY NO (Travel Resolutions for 2023 #5)
Overall, this is going to be a huge change to my lifestyle and I’m going to have to start saying no to things. But Veronica you just said to have a “always down” mindset. I know what I said, but I think that in terms of traveling, you can’t say yes to everything because you need to set boundaries for yourself. Especially if you want to follow a strict budget so that you can travel to those destinations and be the always down person on your trip then you need to start thinking about ways to plan ahead and save money for that.
This is probably something that’s going to be SO hard for me because I hate to say no to things. When someone asks to hang out or when a plan is made, I hate saying no because I really value my friendships and I want to keep those but I know going into this next year I am going to really need to practice that more.
Travel Resolutions for 2023 #6: Write Down Your Bucket List Destinations
Right at the start of the new year, I want you to write a list of 50 things that you want to experience and destinations you want to travel to before the end of 2023. Consider this as a manifestation of your year in travel. This is OUR year so we need to claim it. Write on your bucket list, and include places that you really want to visit, and make that your goal for you to work towards. We all need a little motivator and this does exactly that.
Travel Resolutions for 2023 #7: Manifest Using Your PTO, Guilty Free
Maybe not all of us have this guilty feeling from taking off of work, but a resolution of mine is to take off GUILTY-FREE. You can get caught up in work, wanting to do well, and not letting your team/boss down, but I promise once you start to realize that if you don’t take off work, you will burnout and not only that but miss out of tons of new experiences such as *cough cough* traveling.
When I first started my job it was during COVID, but also I didn’t take off for a few months, and realizing now how bad that was I want to make sure I plan out my time off so that I’m not stuck with a bunch of days at the end and vice versa, having to work 4 months straight. You should have conversations with your boss to see what a typical vacation time looks like. Some jobs allow you to take all the time off at once, preferably less than 7-day trips, it all depends!
Travel Resolution #8: Stick to One Airline
You don’t understand how important this travel resolution for 2023 is. By sticking to one airline (& I know it’s hard since not every airline goes to all of the destinations) you get so frequent flyer benefits that can turn into free flights, free upgrades & opportunities to travel more! Check out the travel partners to see which airline you use more and start racking up miles!
- https://www.delta.com/us/en/airline-partners/overview
- https://www.aa.com/i18n/aadvantage-program/miles/partners/partner-airlines.jsp
- https://www.united.com/ual/en/us/fly/mileageplus/earn-miles/airline-partners.html
- https://www.jetblue.com/airline-partners
Travel Resolution #9: Invest In a Travel Credit Card
Travel credit cards work WONDERS for your travel lifestyle. From getting up to 2.5x rewards for making regular purchases you’re already doing, you can get free flights by literally paying your rent. Travel Credit cards have some of the best sign-on bonuses if you purchase x amount in x time, you get free miles that equate to free flights. This is also great if you’re planning on traveling somewhere super expensive, which could make it seem like the price is 50% off. I have both the Capital One Venture Card & the American Express Gold Delta Card.
I’d recommend getting either of these for sure but do some shopping around to see what fits your needs. If you’re planning on flying with United a lot, then consider getting their credit card. (I think that’s my next credit card tbh!!). Once you start using a travel credit card, you’ll quickly realize that the annual fees are minimal to the rewards you get!
Travel Resolutions #10: Do Things/Activities That’ll Get You Out of Your Comfort Zone
If you’re traveling and not doing something new, then wyd??? Traveling gives you the capability to expose yourself to new and unfamiliar environments that you wouldn’t be able to do in other circumstances. I believe that keeping an open mind allows you to let loose, have fun, learn more & overall prove just how much traveling is beneficial to your mental, physical, and spiritual state of mind. My favorite part is that you never know what might turn into a new hobby, favorite food, excursion, culture, or travel lifestyle that’ll change your life for the better.
Travel Resolution #11: Just Book It
Just Booking It this past year has allowed me to get more comfortable with the unknown and what I mean by that is being okay with not having everything planned out. Believe it or not, almost half of the things planned on a trip do not go to plan, and needing to stick to a Type-A itinerary can be stressful for not only yourself but those around you. Test it out in the new year. Go on a spontaneous adventure near or far and test how comfortable you are with “going with the flow” & you’ll see major improvements in your mental state of mind and will become more relaxed!
So There You Have It
This 2023 is going to be the best year yet!! You heard me, let’s start manifesting this year because trust me it feels as though we have been through hell and back during 2022. To everyone fighting silent battles, I HEAR YOU. From my experiences, the one thing that really keeps me moving is knowing that there is so much left to see in the world and how travel can really change your mood in an instant. Keep your chin up because YOU GOT THIS! I am cheering you on 1000% of the way. I hope you enjoyed these travel resolutions for 2023 and let me know which travel resolution stuck to you the most. Be sure to comment on any new ones you plan on having and stay up to date on all things travel here!
what do you think?