“The world is a book, and those who do not travel, only read one page.”
– – Saint Augustine.
Travelling, in today’s world, has become almost like a necessity. An escape from the travails of city life into the heart of nature. There is this internal yearning among the lot of us, an unspeakable agony, to get away, to go to places unseen and meet people unknown. To disappear into the heart of the mountains, to breathe in that pristine air, or perhaps to walk along the soft white sands of serene beaches by the capricious sea. Often, solo travelling is a joy and teaches you much about the world, but there are times when the companionship of friends can make your travels more hearty, soulful even.
So, how can you convince your friends to travel with you? Shake of their lethargy and dive into the flighty temptress that is adventure? Well, here are a few tips which could be helpful for you:
Lure them with Pictures
Tempt your friends with pictures of beautiful locations from the world over. Message them a link everyday filled with photos of the Earth in all its glorious wonder. You could even mail them a picture at opportune times, or even send it via instant messaging apps. Photos laden with inspirational quotes about travelling could work wonders as well. Appeal to their sense of adventure, of intoxicating freedom of just going out and wandering in many wondrous hideaways that the world has to offer.
After all, a picture paints a thousand words.
Watch Movies Together
The joy of movies is that you get to live vicariously through the protagonist. You feel for your favourite characters and through the medium of cinema, you see what they see and experience what they experience. For a few moments, you are them.
Watching these films will inspire and motivate you to go on similar journeys, much like your protagonists, and see the splendour of the world. The world is vast, and if you do not travel, have you truly lived?
Push the Right Buttons
You know your friends best, so push the right buttons and entice them into travelling with you. What is it that your pals most like? Is it the outdoors? The beaches? The mountains? The parties? The people?
Whatever it is, build it up for them, explain how they’ll be missing out on the experience of a lifetime, and that perhaps in the future, you may not have such an opportunity to spend time together and experience the delight of travelling. Slowly, but surely, you’ll overcome their resistance.
Start Planning
Talk hypothetically about possible destinations and what you could do once you get there. Make plans, this will give you something to aim for, a tentative target which you can look forward to. Thus, you will move from the realms of ideation to something concrete, something to aim for.
Share Experiences
Share the experiences of other travellers who have seen the world and are better for it. There are numerous blogs and articles out there willing to show you the way such as this one, many of them much more personal as well, which could be a good guide for what you could hope to see and experience on the road.
Keep working at your friends, advise them to save money and go on that trip. It could be life-changing, it could be exciting, but one thing it won’t be is boring. You’ll be making memories for a lifetime, and those are the things that are truly priceless in life.
