Ask John: 10 Travel Hacks to Live Inspired on the Road
I know you travel a lot. So do I…. and I hate it! How do you stay so positive in the drudgery of your work trips? — Mary N.
Mary, here are 10 things I try to do every time I travel:
- Eat healthier on the road.
- Don’t watch television in your hotel room.
- Lower your alcohol consumption.
- Get TSA prescreened.
- Check-in online 24 hours before flight.
- Carry-on your bags.
- Drink one cup of water for every 30 minutes in the air.
- Wash your hands frequently.
- View travel time as a gift to get things done, not as punishment for the career you’ve chosen.
- Facetime family each day when on the road.
These help, but why put on a Band-aid on a wound that requires stitches? What most of us need are not ‘travel hacks,’ but a clearer perspective on what actually matters.
Let me explain. Whether you are a cashier or a corporate lawyer, a child-free professional or a single mother, a worker of the night shift or the day shift or both — one thing remains true: after your shift you will get home, do your daily routine there, go to bed and then do it all again tomorrow.
So then, the CEO in business class on a flight and the drifter in the back row of a Greyhound are both struggling with the same question: What’s the point of all of this?
It’s a question we each must boldly embrace and answer or passively ignore and lose ourselves to the monotony of the day, week, job, travel,life. The dozens of hours we spend staring at our phones each week is evidence of how many choose to answer this question.
Mary, my advice is this: Choose to view everything in life as a remarkable gift. That decision will absolutely transform delays into moments of grace; work travel into periods of wonderful discovery, chronic challenges into continuous opportunities; and the drudgery of another day into the truth that each day is a gift, time is fleeting, and no moment should be taken for granted.
So consider the travel hacks above, but don’t forget the life hack that makes it matter in the first place.
Source: John O'Leary via Parade.com
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