Question number 4…
How has traveling impacted your compassion and acceptance for others?
Yes. When you see the way the vast majority of the world lives, it’s hard if not impossible to NOT feel more compassionate for them. It’s one thing to see a family on TV that’s struggling to make ends meet abroad, or hear about them in a magazine – and jump to the conclusion that they just aren’t working hard enough. It’s quite another thing to say hi to that same family, see their home with your own eyes, sit & have them serve you tea, and hear of their struggles with your own ears.
You’ll quickly realize they work as hard, if not harder, than you do.
They just weren’t born in America. Or the UK. Or Germany.
Instead, they were born in Sudan. Ghana. Or Bangladesh.
Where someone is born shouldn’t dictate whether they are given an opportunity to succeed in life. Yet that’s the way the world works right now, and it sucks major ass. They didn’t choose the life they were born into, but they are dealing with the cards they were dealt in life – day in, day out.
If you have experiences like this first hand while traveling, and you don’t end up more compassionate for others – I frankly don’t know what’s wrong with you.
Drew Meyers
Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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