The Trips I Pretended to Love
There is a quiet kind of disappointment that shows up on trips that are supposed to be great. The kind you barely admit to yourself. Everything works. The hotel is beautiful. The photos look right. And still, something feels flat. I remember walking through Zermatt, Switzerland, a place engineered for awe, and thinking, very softly, I should be feeling more than this. I immediately tried to talk myself out of it. It was a good trip. A great one, even. Nothing was wrong.
Except the feeling never arrived.
The Performance No One Asked For
For a long time, I evaluated trips the same way I evaluated résumés. Was it impressive? Was it interesting? Did it signal good taste? In my twenties and early thirties, travel felt like proof. Proof that I was curious. Sophisticated. Doing life the right way. So I chased pins on maps and itineraries that looked ambitious. I wanted trips that could not be mistaken for ordinary.
Somewhere along the way, I stopped asking whether I actually enjoyed them.
When “Just Wander” Isn’t Romantic
On paper, my Europe trip was excellent. The planned parts sang. The trouble crept in during the in-between hours, the ones people describe as magical. Wandering. Stumbling upon things. Letting the day unfold. Instead of magic, I felt friction. Not panic, just a low hum of pressure. A sense that I was missing something better, that time was leaking away. That gap between what I expected to feel and what I actually felt told me the truth. The problem was not the place. It was the way I was approaching it.
Two Trips That Changed the Equation
Fiji showed me this without trying. It was familiar. A repeat trip. No proving, no chasing, no constant decisions. The experience was warm and human and quietly luxurious, without needing to announce itself. I could settle in. Disney did the same thing from the opposite direction. That trip was deeply planned, but not rigid. The thinking happened early, so the days felt easy. We moved freely. We pivoted without stress. Preparation did not box us in. It opened things up.
Different styles. Same outcome.
Presence.
A Quieter Definition of Wanderlust
I used to think real travel meant novelty. New countries. New stamps. A little grit. A little inconvenience. Anything too smooth felt like cheating. Now I think wanderlust is simpler than that. It is the desire to feel alive somewhere else. To feel connected. To feel softened. To come home changed in small but meaningful ways. Sometimes that happens on repeat trips. Sometimes it happens with structure. Sometimes it happens when the trip fits your season of life instead of your past identity.
The Real Point
Vacations carry more emotional weight than we admit. They sit at the intersection of time, money, and hope. That makes them easy places to perform. But the best trips are not the ones that look impressive. They are the ones that feel honest.
If there is any takeaway here, it is this: design trips for the people who are actually on them. Not your younger self. Not the internet. Not an imaginary audience.
Travel does not need to prove anything.
It just needs to meet you where you are.
