Embracing Independence: The Ultimate Guide to Solo Travel and Self-Reliance

Have you ever felt the thrill of conquering a fear, turning it into your most cherished strength? That's the transition I underwent when I embarked on my solo travel escapades, and it's a transformation I'm excited to guide you through in our latest podcast episode. Traveling alone can be daunting; it stirs up anxieties and fears that many of us would rather avoid. But what if the key to unlocking the world was in your own backyard? From the comfort of your local cafe to the leap of faith into skydiving, join me as I recount how normalizing solo activities led to a newfound confidence, readying me for adventures across the globe.

Stepping onto a bus or hailing a ride in your hometown might not seem like a big deal, but it's these actions that form the bedrock of self-reliance essential for exploring new territories. In this episode, we focus on practical steps you can take to cultivate your independence before even packing a suitcase. Learn how mastering your local transit system or navigating a shopping trip on your own can equip you with the tools needed to face the uncertainties of international travel head-on. Break away from the discomfort of solitude and stride confidently into the rewarding realm of solo travel, as I share tips and experiences to transform your journey into an empowering rite of passage.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Preparing Yourself for Solo Travel
• 12:14 Building Confidence for Solo Travel

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome back to Solo Travel Adventures, my sister travelers. Well, going solo can be a little worrisome, could cause some anxiety, could make you nervous, especially if this is your first time. And when you do anything new it does require kind of getting over that fear right, and then as you continue to do it more and more, then you kind of get over that fear, you get into practice of it, you become more comfortable in doing that thing, and so a lot of women that have never solo traveled have a huge fear of you know, being alone and how to navigate as a solo traveler. And there are some things as a solo traveler that you will inevitably have to do alone, of course, unless you have decided to join a group tour, to join a group tour. Now, all these things are activities that we may actually do at home, locally, but maybe we do it with a friend or a spouse or a family member joins us in some capacity and therefore we're not really feeling alone. So it makes us feel comfortable and often when people travel women travel alone they are afraid that people are staring at them or judging them or looking at them and thinking, oh, that's a weirdo by themselves. But honestly, in most cases they don't care. They're in their own world and therefore it's not something to be concerned about Now. Will it be uncomfortable at first? Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 1:55

I have been there, been uncomfortable in several situations doing things by myself, even locally. One example I will give is that kind of recently I went skydiving by myself, and that is not something that you do. You usually do it with some friends or you do it with somebody else and you share that experience. But for me, I just needed to do it, I needed to take that leap and, yeah, it was a little awkward because as I was waiting, you know people would say, well, did you come with somebody? And you know the awkward saying, no, you know, they got over it. They figured that I was adventurous, right, and I was doing this all on my own.

Speaker 1: 2:40

So I want to share with you some ways that you could prepare yourself for going solo just at home. I call it going solo at home. These are some five activities or things that you can do right now in your own hometown to prepare yourself for going solo, day-to-day, your daily activities, thinking about doing them alone or solo Now I've been pretty much solo or living alone for almost three years now, so a lot of these activities I'm going to share are kind of second nature to me now because I live alone, so I don't share a space with anybody. But you might still you know whether you have a kid still at home, or you might have a spouse still at home, or you have a roommate, or you just have close friends that you like to hang out with. But here are five things that you can start practicing right now in your hometown and that way, if you start to feel uncomfortable, you can just drive home and be done with it. But, as we know, any kind of thing that is new, whether it's a skill when I think about learning a language or learning a sport, anything like that or just a new skill, we need to practice it in order to feel comfortable in it. The first few times are not going to feel comfortable. So I'm encouraging you to just keep practicing this, not just one time before you go on your trip, but maybe several times, so that you will start to feel comfortable with doing these activities alone and feeling comfortable with yourself being by yourself and figuring and navigating that. And how do you do that Right?

Speaker 1: 4:23

So the first thing it's often really a hard part that most people, when they travel, you're obviously going to have to eat alone, and so let's talk about that one first Eating alone. As I've mentioned before, that nobody's really watching you. Now, when you come in, it may get a little awkward, in which they the server or the hostess, the one that's going to seat you, may you know when they ask how many and you say one. You know there might be a little awkwardness in that, all right, and they, some places, might even want to put you at the bar, but which is fine. But I'm going to recommend that you really ask for a table. You have every right to ask for a table and hopefully that's the case in the restaurants that you want to go to. Sometimes it might not be so, just be aware of that. But at home, I want you to practice going out eating alone.

Speaker 1: 5:23

Now, this is not your fast food or takeout. I want you to go to a sit-down restaurant by yourself and get a table, not the bar, because I want you to get a feel for what it's like. And you often say, well, what do I do when I just sit there? I know many people will just grab their phones, because then that makes them look busy, they don't have to look at anybody and it kind of eases that uncomfortableness. But I would really recommend that you utilize the time you know. Maybe you bring a book with you. Or I like to people watch sometimes, especially if I'm seated at a table that's maybe near the bar, I like to watch people and maybe kind of analyze and look around and try to determine certain scenarios in my head. Or I just get really reflective or pensive a lot of times if I am eating by myself. So I want you to practice that. Maybe there's a restaurant that you've been wanting to go to, you've been dying to go to, but you can't quite coordinate it with somebody else or it's just not in the cards. Maybe you're dating and you just haven't convinced that person to take you there, right. So take yourself out, go to that restaurant and eat alone at a table. So this is going to be practice. You're going to need to do this more than once, just like anything new that you are discovering.

Speaker 1: 6:51

Number two this might be a little easier thing, but maybe not. It just depends on your personality or maybe your family dynamics. But I would say, shopping alone when you are traveling, you obviously are going to be possibly shopping, hitting some, you know, maybe getting some souvenirs, or stopping in some shops and looking at some of the local, or maybe you're going to be in a local market somewhere, shopping by yourself, and so just shopping alone. And this is a little easier because I find many people already probably do this. Even if you're married, a lot of times one or the other spouse might go alone, right, and grab some stuff for dinner or something, so that might be a little easier one. But if that's not you and you're not accustomed to maybe shopping alone, and that includes not just grocery shopping, and you're not accustomed to maybe shopping alone, and that includes not just grocery shopping, because you will potentially have to grocery shop when you're over there, but also just kind of regular retail shopping. So maybe you know, see how you feel about going by yourself. I find it very freeing because, especially if it's retail shopping, I can take my time and I can look at what I want to look at. So that's number two.

Speaker 1: 8:13

Number three I'm going to encourage you to attend an event alone. So this can be anything from a concert yes, that can be a dance concert, music concert, a festival. There's many festivals, I'm sure your local town hosts some sort of festival, whether it's maybe a Greek festival, or maybe they have a food truck festival or something of that nature Going alone. There's also museums you can go to by yourself, possibly any kind of arts performances a play, a dance, a musical. I just recently, just over the weekend, I attended a dance concert by myself, no big deal. I've been doing this for a while because I can't always get somebody to join me in and I love to see performances. So I decided many years ago, even when I was married, there were occasions when I because my husband at the time would not, he didn't care for those kind of events, so I would often have to go by myself. Wine tasting, possibly. Go by yourself. You're going to be with a group and so it might be actually kind of fun. You can meet people while you're doing that. So attend an event alone.

Speaker 1: 9:24

Uh, number four do an outside activity alone. This could include anything from hiking, kayaking, camping, exercising, maybe running in an event. Maybe you want to run a 5k. Do it alone early and don't wait for somebody, if this is a goal of yours. Uh, birdwatching, local farmers markets that could go, um, both in the sort of a shopping idea, but also it's an outside activity Pickleball. Maybe you just show up to a pickleball of court and you just show up by yourself and they maybe someone else is there or maybe someone has a threesome and they can pair you up with somebody else. So it could work out.

Speaker 1: 10:08

And, like I mentioned, I went skydiving by myself. You could do ziplining. There's lots of outside activities you know that you could do by yourself. You don't have to necessarily feel like you have to have somebody. So that's kind of a big leap, because some of those for example let's just take kayaking, for example that might be something you might get a little nervous about, being alone, in case something would happen. But if you find a good spot where there's a lot of people around maybe you go out from a marina where there are other boats or people around then you're less likely to feel nervous about being completely alone out there and that there will be people around in case.

Speaker 1: 10:50

And then finally, this last one, number five. I would say this is probably for me, probably in part, the most challenging, and I actually planned to do this as I was preparing. I'm like, oh well, I really need to do that here in my city, but I would encourage you to practice taking public transportation. Now, if you are a US, in US this is going to be a challenge because we're so used to just having our own cars typically. Now, if you live in Europe or anywhere that has a great infrastructure where you have easy access to, like trains and subways, then maybe this is not so much of a challenge for you those that are not used to public transportation. I would encourage you because when you travel, especially if you're going to Europe, that is really all I've ever used in Europe is public transportation. When my son was in Japan, that's all he used was public transportation. So in lots of other countries that's going to be the best way to get around. For example, even when I went to Ireland, I did run a car, but for the two days we were in Dublin we took public transportation because it was just going to be a lot easier. We didn't have to worry about parking the car and navigating the hecticness of the city.

Speaker 1: 12:14

So learning how to take either whether it's a local bus, a local train, a subway or even which this might be a little easier and you might feel a little safer is figuring out how to take an Uber. If you're not accustomed to it, then that would be good practice. But if you've already kind of know how to navigate, requesting an Uber or a Lyft, then no need to kind of practice that. But the public transportation bit, I know I am planning, because getting to sort of the south area of Dallas I live in Dallas can be a little tricky. Yes, I can drive, but we have a great. It's called DART, which is Dallas Area Rapid Transit System. That's fabulous. It goes down into those areas that can be, you know, lots of traffic. I could avoid that if I did take the DART. So I am going to consider doing that for myself as practice in getting down into the city a little easier and not having to worry about traffic city a little easier and not having to worry about traffic.

Speaker 1: 13:25

So those are five different categories, different activities that I encourage you to practice at home.

Speaker 1: 13:29

If this is, if you are leery about going solo and you're nervous about being alone doing any of these activities, the best thing you can do is to practice this all in your hometown and the more you do it, the more you're going to get comfortable with that whole idea so that when you go to another country and there's other barriers involved possibly a language barrier or just understanding some of their different systems that they use, whether it's where to go to shop, where to do some activities, or where is the how to get to the public transportation and navigating that.

Speaker 1: 14:11

So having kind of that confidence in doing it at home will carry over into when you go abroad, and so I'm encouraging all those sisters out there that have not solo traveled or maybe you're still new to solo travel and you want to get more comfortable in that whole idea of being alone then I encourage you do these five activities at home and go solo at home and get your confidence built up. So when you do go overseas, you are going to just be flying and you're not even going to think about what other people are thinking about you. As far as, hey, I'm doing this alone, you're going to not care because you're going to be so confident in yourself that it won't matter. It won't matter that people might be looking at you and they won't be, though, trust me. So let's get that practice in so that we can feel confident and get out there and have those adventure sisters.