366: 5 Insights From Midlife Solo Travel (and why you should try it)

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Courtney Townley 0:00
Welcome to the Grace and Grit Podcast made for women who want their healthiest years to be ahead of them, not behind them. Join your host Courtney Townley right now as she breaks down the fairy tale health story you have been chasing all of your life into sensible action steps and lasting change.

Courtney Townley 0:28
Spending time alone at midlife can feel like an impossible task amid so many responsibilities, and it’s incredibly important if you want to cultivate a strong relationship with yourself. Why? Because it’s really hard to know yourself and honor your needs if you aren’t taking time to get to know yourself.

Courtney Townley 0:50
So solo trips and adventures by yourself can be a really great way to reconnect with yourself. It also helps to relieve stress, clarify decisions that need to be made, fortify your confidence, and so much more so in this episode of the grace and grit podcast, I am going to share with you five insights that I recently had from my own solo travel with the hopes that it might inspire you to plan a little getaway for yourself, whether that’s in your own backyard or halfway around the world.

Courtney Townley 1:27
Welcome to the Grace and Grit Podcast. This is your host, Courtney Townley, thank you so much for being here today. Before we launch into this episode, I do want to let you know that I am hosting an event in September called Base Camp: Back to Basics.

Courtney Townley 1:43
This event is specifically geared towards midlife women who are coming out of the summer months and looking for reasonable ways to realign with their own self care. So this event is going to focus very heavily on the things that science shows us time and time again help that help to improve the health of a human. And we are not doing any radical overhauls. We are not going to extreme measures. We are basically taking radical responsibility for showing up to do things that will help us to realign and move the needle of progress.

Courtney Townley 2:22
If you are someone who is coming out of the summer months and feeling like you could use a little leg up in helping you to get realigned with your own self care, do not miss this opportunity. There’s so much goodness baked into this event. I open up the event on September 9 with a masterclass explaining what we’re focusing on for the month, and also helping you to understand the parameters of the event.

Courtney Townley 1:44
I also give you a companion guide so you can stay accountable to your own commitments and you can apply the things that you’re learning. And I’m also providing a tremendous amount of opportunity for additional support. So I have an online Facebook group that will be very active during this period. And I’m also doing a handful of group coaching calls, which all participants are invited to, so we can work through challenges throughout the month. So if you want to hear a little bit more about the event, you want to get yourself registered, just head on over to graceandgrit.com/basecamp. Once again, graceandgrit.com/basecamp. I really hope to see you there.

Courtney Townley 3:08
Now on to today’s episode. I titled this episode 5 Insights From Midlife Solo Travel. Some of you may know if you’re longtime listeners, if you listen to the podcast on a regular basis, if you’re a client of mine, if you’re in the rumble and rise arena, I recently returned from a two and a half week solo adventure to Portugal, and truth be told, this was actually not supposed to be a solo adventure. My parents and I have been planning this trip for almost a year, and two days before we were set to leave, they had to cancel because my dad got hurt and they were unable to travel. Now I’ve been a lifelong solo traveler, so it was not a problem for me to pivot really quickly and just decide that I was still going to take the trip. I obviously was going to adjust my itinerary, and I ended up spending a week in Porto, actually, about 10 days in Porto, Portugal, and then a week in the Azores Islands.

Courtney Townley 3:08
And I learned so much goodness about myself this year. I always do, but it really compelled me to create this episode for you today, because I really am such an advocate of solo travel, especially for midlife women, because I really see it as a nutrient in my own life, and I have seen it become a nutrient, and even, dare I say, a superfood, for so many of the women that I work with. So I know that when I talk about solo travel, a lot of people. Will go to that place where they’re like, Oh, you must be so lucky, and how nice for you. And I’m not sharing it to brag. I’m not sharing this sort of experience to make you feel bad about where you are right now. In fact, I’m trying to do the opposite.

Courtney Townley 5:19
The reason I am able to take this trip, and the reason I typically take trips alone in the month of August is number one. My son goes to skateboard camp every year. He loves it. He looks forward to it all year long he is not home. My husband is deep in the throes of the busiest season for him, he’s a builder in Montana. So as you can imagine, they have a lot of things they need to get done before the ground freezes and before the snow flies. So it is definitely a convenient time for me to be away, and it’s also a slower time in my business.

Courtney Townley 5:56
So you know, I am very fortunate that I always have business, but I definitely notice that there’s just a different energy to my community, to my clients in the month of August, because people are they want to make the most of the last days of summer. And understandably so, so it makes a lot of sense for me to go on these adventures at the end of the summer.

Courtney Townley 6:20
Now, I do want to address some pushback that I get when I talk about traveling alone, because, Dear God, there is not any shortage of pushback that I have heard from family, from friends, from clients, from people I don’t even know. And I think it’s important to address this, because if you decide to take a little bit of time for yourself and travel alone, I guarantee you’re going to hear something similar.

Courtney Townley 6:48
So the first thing that I often hear is something along the lines of, oh, it’s amazing that your husband allows you to do that, which I always I just makes me giggle because my husband doesn’t allow me to do anything. My husband and I support one another in the things that help to bring us alive. That’s what supportive partners do. And so my husband and I were very complete people before we met and we chose to be together because we really loved who the other person was, and what makes us who we are are the things that we spend time and energy on, like solo travel. So my husband is a huge advocate for me traveling alone because he has witnessed firsthand over the course of a 20 year marriage, how therapeutic it is for me, and often I’ve shared this on the podcast before, he will often recognize when I need time alone before I even do and so he will Just lovingly pull me aside and say, Hey, babe, I think it’s time. I think it’s time you just take a few days, take what you need, and just reconnect and then come back. And so he is very supportive, and he is a massive beneficiary. So my husband has the evidence that when I take time to kind of check out a little bit and just be responsible for myself for a few days, in this case, a few weeks, I am so much more available to him and to my son, I show up in a more powerful way in every aspect of my life. So my husband does not allow me to travel alone. My husband supports me in my desire to travel alone. I think that’s a really important distinction.

Courtney Townley 8:52
I also get some pushback, where people will say to me, Oh, it must be so nice, you know, to have a job that allows you to do that? Well, yes, and I consciously chose to cultivate a career that would allow me to take this much needed time, because I know how important it is to my health and happiness. So it didn’t just happen by chance. It’s not just luck that landed me here. I have to work for it. I had to cultivate a business that allowed me that space. That wasn’t an overnight thing. I have to save for it. I don’t have money. I don’t know what to do with so I have to plan in advance. I have to structure my business so my clients still feel supported while I am gone. That’s all a pre decision that isn’t just luck,

Courtney Townley 9:55
okay. The other thing I want to address is I often hear that it’s very dangerous for what. And to travel alone. Like, how do you feel safe doing that? Courtney, you’re going to, you know, a lot of times I do travel abroad, and I can’t believe you feel safe and secure doing that. Well, that is absolutely one way to look at it, right. Like, I it could be dangerous if I didn’t think things through, if I made silly decisions, there’s always uncertainty, like no matter how well you think you’re insulated, things can always happen. But I choose not to focus on that. I absolutely make an effort to make the best decisions that I can. I don’t walk down dark alleys late at night. You know, I’m not out late at night period, and I am aware of my surroundings. In fact, I think I’m more aware of my surroundings when I travel alone than I am when I’m actually at home. So I could argue that I think I’m even safer when I’m traveling because I’m paying more attention. And the other part of that is I would also argue that, yes, I could focus on the danger of traveling alone, or I could focus on how empowering it is to travel alone, and that’s what I choose to focus on, because it has probably, single handedly been one of the biggest confidence builders for me, because the only person I have to rely on when I am traveling alone is myself. I can’t ask my husband to do something for me. I can’t ask, you know, my friends or family, because they’re not with me. Everything that I do relies that I depend on myself when I’m traveling alone. And for me, that has been a wonderful thing, not a bad thing.

Courtney Townley 11:47
The other piece of pushback that I think is, I think we put push, we put this a little bit on ourselves as women. And I have also heard this comment from other people that, shouldn’t you be spending time with other people, like, why wouldn’t you want to spend this time with your family or your friends or the other people in your life? And my response to that is, I do spend a lot of time with my family and friends. I make a very concerted effort to spend time with my family and friends, and I know, like I said earlier, that I am in a much better position to show up as my most powerful and lovely self with my family and friends, when I am taken care of, when I know who I am And what I need to feel supported, and traveling alone has revealed that to me in so many ways throughout the years.

Courtney Townley 12:49
So if you decide to spend time alone, expect pushback from yourself and certainly from all people around you, because there is no shortage of people who will challenge you on your decision to travel alone. So five things I want to share with you really quickly about just kind of some insights that I’ve had, and this is accumulation of my travel over the years, but all of these things were just really highlighted during my travels this year.

Courtney Townley 13:21
So number one is I never fully realize how wound up I truly am until I am like deep into my travels alone. So on this past trip, it took me nearly a week to decompress and feel like I was coming back to life. And so what did I do in that first week? I slept a ton. I ate amazing food. I walked my face off. I had zero plans, zero obligations. I spent little to no time on the internet. I didn’t watch TV, and I kind of woke up, like, literally and figuratively after a week to feeling like, Oh, hi, Courtney, there you are. Where have you been? Right? I didn’t realize how tired you were. I didn’t realize how much you needed this. And you would think again, after all these trips that I’ve taken by myself over the years, that I would know by now that I need a good chunk of time to decompress. For some reason, it always kind of surprises me that I still need that kind of time in order to rest and recuperate.

Courtney Townley 14:47
So the second thing that I wanted to share is that it is incredibly therapeutic to not talk and not have to make decisions for other people. So. So when I’m traveling by myself, keep in mind, in this situation, and also, last year I was in Portugal. So the past two years, I’ve taken a trip to Portugal, and there’s another trip coming up next year, which I’m going to tell you about by the end of this episode. But I don’t speak Portuguese. I’m learning I’m like, I think, like, 300 days into my Duolingo, I definitely have Portuguese friends that I’m always challenging to speak to me in Portuguese so I can learn the language. I’m paying attention when I’m there. I’m trying to pick up on words and practice a little bit of talking, but I don’t talk to the degree that I talk when I’m at home. I mean, consider my career. I’m a coach. I’m talking all the time. I have a podcast talking all the time. I’m always talking to my husband, talking to my kid, talking to my family and friends. There’s a lot of talking. I love talking, and it’s so therapeutic to not talk for a while. And so for me, traveling alone, obviously I talk a lot less, especially traveling through a foreign country, and not having to make as many decisions is incredibly restorative for me.

Courtney Townley 16:24
So again, the only person I’m making decisions for when I travel alone is myself, and I notice that when I come home, I am able to make decisions much quicker and much more confidently because I’ve had a break from decision making, so in that way too, incredibly therapeutic. I mentioned this before, but I do want to highlight it as an insight that there’s something incredibly empowering about having to rely on myself when I travel alone. So things go haywire right when I get lost. I have to figure out how to find my way. When I don’t understand how to do something like get into a hotel or check out or find a certain restaurant, whatever the case may be, I have to figure it out. And this sounds really silly, but I hope you can relate that in my everyday life, I definitely have become dependent on certain people doing certain things for me, specifically my husband, right? You kind of fall into a rhythm in your relationship where I take responsibility for certain things and he takes responsibility for certain things, which is lovely, and that’s what a partnership, you know?

Courtney Townley 17:43
That’s one of the benefits of a partnership, but it’s also a little bit disempowering, because the things that he takes responsibility for, I lose practice in so when I’m traveling alone, all that responsibility is on me, and that is definitely not a bad thing. It just reminds me that I’m capable of doing these things. I am a little bit out of practice, but it is so rewarding on the other side of figuring those things out, and I know that’s a really scary proposition for a lot of people when they consider traveling alone, that that’s the very reason they don’t travel alone. They’re gonna have to figure things out, but I just want to challenge you to consider that that’s a huge perk, not a bad thing.

Courtney Townley 18:29
The the fourth insight I want to share with you is just that I notice things more when I travel alone, because again, I’m not I’m not distracted. I’m not focusing on other things. I’m just with myself and the environment. So some of the best meals I’ve ever had in my life have been in restaurants by myself. And I think one of the reasons that’s true is because I taste the food in a way that I don’t normally taste it when I’m with other people, because I’m focused on other things. I’m focusing on the conversation, I’m focusing on people’s comfort, on whatever else is happening around me. So when I eat a meal alone, there’s just it’s just a different experience. And the same is true when I am walking through a place I’ve never been before by myself, I’m much more aware of my environment, of the people, of the colors, the smells, and that is Just so deeply, deeply satisfying. One of the things I hear a lot from clients when we’re talking about them potentially taking a little bit of time for themselves, is, of course, they don’t know what to do. That’s what that’s what they say. I don’t know what I would do with myself if I went away for a weekend by myself.

Courtney Townley 19:58
And I just want to offer that. But it’s very liberating to remind yourself that you don’t need to do anything. What if going away by yourself was just a practice in being with yourself? And here I will promise you this, if you take time to be with yourself, you will be inspired to do certain things. I took a cooking class in Portugal this year. I went to a concert. And there were many days where I did absolutely nothing but walk and eat and sleep and observe and reflect, and that was a lot. I wasn’t productive.

Courtney Townley 20:40
Some would argue, and that non productivity made me so much more effective when I returned to the rhythm of my life. And the last thing I want to share with you is I challenged myself last year, when I traveled in August alone, to only take one carry on suitcase, and I wasn’t aware at the time of how significant that would be, it forced me to really decide hard about what I needed to travel with, which was way less than I have ever traveled with before. And this year, I took it even to another level. I still traveled with that same carry on suitcase, but I challenged myself to travel with even less, because last year, there were a lot of things I still didn’t use. There were some clothes I took, I think I took an extra pair of shoes, an extra swimsuit. And so this year, I pared down even more, and it was such a lovely reminder that I don’t need a lot to be happy like I don’t. In fact, traveling with less allows me to enjoy my trip so much more, because I’m not weighed down by managing stuff. I’m not weighed down by carrying stuff. I just I have what I need, and that is enough. So I’m really excited about my next trip, because I’m going to take it even further, because again, I keep learning that I’m packing more than I need.

Courtney Townley 22:30
So speaking of next year, I want to share with you at the end of this podcast today that serendipitous things always happen to me when I’m traveling. I meet certain people, I find certain places. I have certain revelations about things I want to do or I’m working on in my life, and this trip certainly was no exception. I through a friend of mine ended up staying at an incredible new retreat center in the Azores Islands and anyway, through a lot of different conversations with the owners and spending a week of time there myself, I decided I’m going to run a retreat in the Azores Islands next August.

Courtney Townley 23:15
Some of you may know that I have been running retreats here in the state of Montana for the past two years, and they have been amazing and wonderful, and I may still continue to run a retreat a year here in Montana, but I definitely want to dip my toe in the waters of sharing what has become such a special place in my heart with my community, which is Portugal. So if you have ever had the desire to go to Portugal and you would love to pair that with a women’s retreat for five days, stay tuned, because I will be sharing more details about it later this year, and probably the best place to stay connected on that specific offering is making sure you’re a part of my email list.

Courtney Townley 24:00
So if you are not a current subscriber, just head on over to graceandgrit.com/rumbleandrise and you will be able to sign up for my weekly newsletter. And so when we open the doors for registration and I’m ready to share more details about that event, you will be among the first to know.

Courtney Townley 24:20
So before we close out the episode today, I want to challenge you to consider a few things about maybe your own solo travel. Because again, like I said at the beginning of this episode, I wanted to maybe plant the seed in you to either take your first solo adventure or uplevel a solo adventure. Maybe you are someone who takes time for yourself frequently. But how could you maybe take that to the next level? So a few considerations, when was the last time you took a trip alone? Was it in the last year? Was it 10 years ago? Can you not even remember what. But just ask yourself, when was the last time you traveled alone? What’s standing in your way from planning a solo adventure? Is it beliefs about what might happen or about your capabilities? Is it money, feeling like you don’t have the money to do it because it does not have to cost you a lot? There are so many ways to take solo adventures that do not cost a lot of money. Is it lack of time? Is it fear of something that might happen?

Courtney Townley 25:29
Get clear with yourself why you’re resisting doing it, or why you haven’t done it in so long. What are your fears? Where might you go? What might you do? Could you be okay with not having a plan of what to do? I have coached so many women on this very topic throughout the years, and I got to tell you, everybody who who dabbles in it, who takes the assignment Seriously, I’ve never heard a negative experience. I have only heard wonderful things, and I’ve had clients just go in their own town to a hotel for the night by themselves. I’ve had clients take a whole weekend to go to a neighboring town. I’ve had clients travel the world by themselves, but it really is such a brilliant way to get to know yourself and where maybe some of the gaps are in the relationship that you have with yourself. So food for thought.

Courtney Townley 26:27
Again, it’s part of the reason I run retreats. It’s kind of a safe incubator for women who are ready to kind of step out and maybe take that, that next step in spending time with themselves in the safety of like an incubator of being around other women, but in a new environment. But certainly the sky’s the limit here with the ways that you could interpret this and the adventures that you could take with yourself. So food for thought. I hope this was inspiring. I hope it was helpful, and like I said at the beginning of the episode, we do have this Base Camp: Back to Basics. Challenge happening in September, I would love for you to be a part of it. You can read all the details and get yourself registered at graceandgrit.com/basecamp. I really hope to see you there. Have a great week, my friends. Take care. You.

Courtney Townley 27:23
Thank you for listening to the Grace and Grit Podcast. It is time to mend the fabric of the female health story, and it starts with you taking radical responsibility for your own self care. You are worth the effort, and with a little grace and grit, anything is possible you.