Travel, Consumption and Happiness

Consumption and happiness is a huge discussion that I can’t breakdown completely in a short post, but to summarize consumption does not generate genuine happiness.

Travel is often lauded as a way to find happiness and I want to dissuade you of this opinion. Travel is just another form of consumption. And traveling for the sake of traveling or to create happiness is not a viable strategy. This does not mean you can not get happiness from traveling. It just means it has to come from a second order effect of traveling, mainly challenging yourself or your comfort zone, learning new things and renewing or making personal connections.

Travel is also a form of consumption that is much easier to share and flaunt on social media. When seeing this consumption and getting jealous realize that you can generate similar rewards to them without the same consumption in many other ways, though they may not fit well in a square photo.