reflection

Meaningful lessons – Part 2

by Steve Brock on August 15, 2012

Last time I noted the second anniversary of this blog. Two years seems like a ridiculously short time to celebrate, and yet I’ve learned a great deal in that time.

In addition to the points noted before, here’s one of the biggest realizations for me over the last 24 months:

This blog has both helped and hurt my travels. Helped in that it forces me to think about the deeper aspects of travel and how God uses it to change us. Hurt in that I sometimes think more about how I’ll describe an experience on a trip for others rather than just having the experience myself.

San Gimignano Twilight Walk 2

I recall a lunch meeting with John Medina, author of the bestseller, Brain Rules. Since John is a neuroscientist, I wanted to pick his brain (pun intended, unfortunately) about how we think while we travel. We discussed issues of how we process sensory information in a foreign place, how déjà vu works and how our memories often distort what we remember about a trip.

At least I think that’s what we talked about…

I then told him about an odd experience last year while driving through Lima, Peru. As we rode from downtown back to the airport, I was conscious of trying to mentally record all the signs and sights that whizzed past us. I knew that within a single curious billboard lay the stuff of a great story, the raw materials of an interesting blog post.

And yet, there was more than I could take in or process. The very act of being aware of what I might write about diminished the experience itself.

On hearing this anecdote, John confirmed what I already suspected: Despite all our claims at multitasking, the brain can only focus on one primary issue at a time. In my case, the lesson was clear: you can’t simultaneously filter an experience for your audience and be fully present to it yourself.

So I have to catch myself now when I’m on a trip and I think, “This could be a great story for The Meaningful Traveler.” If I’m not careful, the experience slips by, not fully observed for the paradoxical reason that I tried to observe it rather than simply being present to it.

So of all the lessons I’ve learned over the last two years with this blog, here’s probably the biggest. Enjoy travel. Just enjoy it. Be fully present: to the moment, the place, others, yourself and especially, to that still small voice of God who may be speaking in a language of your deepest longings to you in that place.

There are layers upon layers to the simplest of trips and I’ve also come to realize just how much God is a part of all of this. But in the moment is not the time to analyze all that. I know that and have known that long before this blog. But I need to remind myself of this simply thought:

The best way to enjoy the journey is to enjoy the journey. You can figure it out later.

And maybe even write a blog about it.

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Meaningful lessons – Part 1

by Steve Brock on August 7, 2012

Today I celebrate the second anniversary of the launch of The Meaningful Traveler. Today also marks a shade over five years since I stood on a bus crossing the tarmac at Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci Fiumicino airport and decided to write a different kind of travel book.

I look back on my journal from that day in Rome and I see that the original intent of the book hasn’t changed a great deal in the last five years but my experiential understanding of it has. The original idea was to scribe a reverent guide to travel, a way to think about one’s trip from a spiritual perspective. It was to be a lay person’s theology of travel, a way of understanding why travel literally and figuratively moves us so much and how God fits into all that.

After working on the book for a few years and talking with numerous people about it, either in interviews for their experiences with travel or to run ideas by them, I decided to test some of the book concepts through a blog. I’m a marketer, after all, and you never launch anything without testing…

So the blog launched on August 7, 2010 with the intent of laying out various ideas about meaningful travel and seeing which ones people responded to most. I expected others to understand travel better as a result. And yet, I’ve probably learned the most myself, often in unexpected ways.

Here’s some of what I’ve learned over the last two years as a result of writing this blog (and the book):

  • Travel is far more personal than even I suspected. I get far more comments via email than I do in the comments section on the blog. Part of the reason is that despite the proliferation of trip sites, Facebook updates on vacations and personal travel tales, many of you feel more comfortable sharing your own experiences in a more 0ne-to-one manner.
  • Meaningful travel is as much or more about the interior journey as it is the exterior one. How you think about your trip, I’ve come to realize, is as important as the trip itself. Understanding comes with reflection. As we’ll see in Part 2, the key is when and how you think about your trip. Spending too much time trying to figure out the meaning of a trip while you’re on it can get in the way of the experience itself.
  • Since starting the book and blog, my big trips have been worse. Yep. Worse. They are still enjoyable, but despite my own advice, I have somehow elevated the importance of bigger trips, especially international ones. Writing about meaningful travel makes me realize all the potential in a trip. But you can’t force that. Each trip has its own purpose and rhythm. Trying to make a trip into THE trip becomes counterproductive. I should – I do – know better. But another lesson is this: what we know and what we do aren’t always the same…
  • The good news is that smaller trips, even day trips not far from home, have become much richer. I’m able to relax in these and discover things I’ve never noticed before. Presence is easier on these short trips. As a result, God shows up more in the small moments. He’s in the big ones as well, but I don’t always see that. “Cease striving…” (Ps. 46:10) has more implications for travel and for life than I ever realized before.

I’ll share a few additional learnings next time, but for now, let me simply say thanks for reading. And if you feel comfortable, share what you’ve learned about travel over the last two years, either from this blog or your own experience. That’s how we learn…

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Making vs. taking – Part 2

by Steve Brock on April 19, 2012

I have many other photos from a trip to Naples, Italy that are technically better, but the people in this one make it personal and take me right back there

Last time we saw how you can either make or take a photo or a trip. When you “make” it, you invest more of yourself, you’re more intentional and the results are usually more meaningful.

This time, let’s explore five additional ways in which making a great photograph and making a meaningful journey are similar.

  • Time. My family thinks I should have my own show on the Food Channel called “Cooking with Steve.” Each episode would only take ten minutes because the distinctive would be that everything has to be done fast. My theory is, if the recipe says set the oven to 350 degrees, I say bump it up to 425 and save yourself the wait. Why sauté when you can stir fry in half the time? But as I’m finding with learning to bake bread or making sauces, some things simply can’t be rushed. Some food is better prepared in a crock pot than a microwave. Similarly, most photographs and trips also turn out better when you don’t rush them. There’s a place for the fast-paced trip or photo, but in general taking time leads to making better images and memories. 

  • Effort. I hate this one. After all, who goes on vacation and wants to work? But meaningful journeys cost you more than the price of your airfare and hotel. Same with photography. I’ll never be a great photographer because I like sleep (instead of getting up for the great pre-dawn light) and dinner (which I would have to forego to get that great evening light) too much. Making great photos is a lot like sales: Most sales people give up after the third rejection. Most sales, however, are made after the sixth one. With photography, while your first shot is often your best because you capture what you first see, many times the most distinctive shot comes after trying a dozen or more different angles or approaches. Most of us give up after two or three tries. 

  • Personal. Great trips and photographs matter most when they touch you in a unique way. What’s meaningful to you may not matter to another soul. That’s OK. Find what is important to you, in an image or a trip. As they say, personal is powerful and if it moves you, it will likely stir others as well. 

  • People. Our best trips and often our best photographs include people. To a landscape photographer, people might be seen as messing up a photo. But to me, they often provide scale, context and a dynamic element. We ooh and aah over mountains and sunsets. Yet God’s greatest creation walks and talks and looks a lot like us. So get more people into your trips and your shots! 

  • Homework. Often the most meaningful part of a trip comes once you get home and you reflect back on your experience. Often photos that look so-so on your camera can become masterpieces with some effort on your computer at home. Trips are taken abroad, but they are made at home.

Well, that’s my list of ten similarities between great photos and great trips.

How about you? What have you found that makes either a photo or a trip more interesting or meaningful?

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Traveling Light – Part 3

by Steve Brock December 21, 2011

Just as a single flame passed to many others at the Feast of Lights, so too do our trips build on each other revealing something much, much greater…

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Too soon to tell – Part 1

by Steve Brock May 2, 2011

As I’m finding out after returning from Peru, you need time when you get back from a trip to process what you’ve learned, but more importantly to understand the story that lies within the facts surrounding your journey. That fuller story only becomes clear with time.

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The journey ahead

by Steve Brock December 31, 2010

We can learn a great deal about how to approach the coming year from observing the way people in other countries pray.

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Return: Start by minding the end

by Steve Brock August 11, 2010

You can improve your trips by preparing not just for how you will depart but also how you will return.

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