Grains of sand shuffling beneath your toes. Stunning vistas that seem to call your name. Wild nights in a bustling metropolis, full of alcohol and scandal. Or perhaps just a familiar tune and warm feeling inside. When I mention the word “wanderlust” to you, these things, among many others, may come to mind. The very word plays on our fantasies, conjuring up the most fantastic dreams we can imagine. Few words capture feelings and a general mindset as well as “wanderlust.” Yet, so few words are as enigmatic and in need of proper definition.

As I prepare to embark on a 6 week trip to Yangshuo, China, I have been thinking a lot about wanderlust and its discontents. What does it really mean? What can it tell us about ourselves? Why do we keep stealing foreign words and pretending they are English?

(Okay, maybe less about the last one)

To answer this, I guess the best place to start is with why people travel at all.

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In my experience with myself and others, there are 3 primary reasons why people choose to uproot themselves and head somewhere new. Tell me if this sounds familiar.

1. The person is genuinely interested in experiencing something different. Perhaps they saw pictures of a French vineyard in an Economist article about wine-making, and now feel they “must” try authentic Chardonnay. Or maybe they are a professional rock-climber whose dream is to scale Half Dome without a harness. Either way, the dream lies in the destination – it is an external crisis.

2. The person is trying to escape something at home. This situation is the exact opposite. Something is disrupting them at home, so they feel the need to escape. A toxic relationship, soul-sucking job, or boring routine can contribute to this feeling. With this person, the destination is far less important. What matters more is the journey. What matters is the peace of mind obtained from distance.

3. The person has lost or become dissatisfied with their identity and is trying to shape a new one. This is subtly different from reason #2. While toxic environments factor into a person’s negative feelings (for others AND themselves), here the motivation is action. The person is looking to take initiative and change, not escape. For this person, the journey IS the destination. They do not measure their trip by sights or distance, but by their mindset shift while gone. For this person, the crisis is completely internal.

If you’re a rational person, you’ll quickly realize that these reasons overlap. A lot. Reason #1 rarely exists without #2, and reason #2 rarely exists without #3. (and vice versa) To illustrate, I’ve never met a person who said they would be bummed to miss school or work and go see Mount Everest. Similarly, people who are trying to escape are also looking to change themselves. It’s extremely difficult to escape without cleaning up negative feelings, and it’s impossible to change when negative feelings are constantly being fed at home.

These 3 intertwined reasons are why we travel. And the desire for the peace of mind that travel allots us is what I define as “wanderlust”. We “lust” for “wanderlust”.

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It’s 9:00 PM. I sit in “The Coffee Shop” on a weeknight. The shop is nearly empty, and the atmosphere is relaxed. In front of me, an older gentleman practices guitar. I am furiously scribbling Chinese characters into a workbook. “Ni” means “you”, I tell myself. And “hao” means “good”. So “ni hao ma” must mean “how are you?” I repeat it a couple times to commit it to memory.

Suddenly, the barista comes over. “Unfortunately, we have to close now.” he says. Disappointed, I thank him for the message and begin packing up. I stare out the window, proud of my accomplishments for the day. Maybe learning Chinese won’t be as bad as I thought it would be.

I enter “The Coffee Shop” two days later, eager to pick up where I left off. I open up the workbook and begin quizzing myself. “Ni” means “woman” I again tell myself. And “hao” means “child”. So “ni hao ma” means…”girl?” Wait, that can’t be right. No, “nu-ar” means “girl!” Or is that something else? Sighing, I look back through the workbook and scribble down the real meaning another 13 times. I should have known it would not be that easy. I lay my head down and begin to wonder what pushed me to take this trip at all.

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There’s this great poem written by 20th century poet Robert W. Service called “The Wanderlust”.

In it, Service details his various experiences with this feeling. He talks about how the need to travel never truly recedes. There is always something pulling him, he explains, even in the worst of conditions. The feeling is not a mere fantasy or suggestion, but a demand his body refuses to ignore. “The Wanderlust has got me . . . by the belly-aching fire, By the fever and the freezing and the pain.”

Perhaps this explains it best, then. I am going to China to see its beautiful sights. I am attempting to learn some Chinese to immerse myself in its culture. I am studying its rich history and cuisine to see how such a country came to be. I long to see its beautiful “Avatar”-like landscapes and hear stories from its people.

I am also traveling because I need to get away. I need to escape the stresses and anxieties I face daily. I need to avoid the environments that have become toxic to my well-being. Distance is something I crave.

But, perhaps most importantly, I am traveling to change myself. I am learning the language to diversify my identity. I am throwing myself into something foreign to experience new things. I am aiming to meet new people and expand my current mindset.

Just like Mr. Service, I suffer from wanderlust.

And chances are, so do you.

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-Truth is, wanderlust doesn’t just manifest itself when we our planning trip itineraries. Parts of it are ever present, always pushing us. Reason #1 colors our lenses with a mild dissatisfaction or anxiety, threatening us to push forward or suffer. Reason #2 can be a response to various life experiences, and reason #3 can be a response to that response.

So it’s important to remember at times of turbulence why we travel. We travel for enjoyment. We travel to see and learn. We travel to escape. We travel to change.

And just as our fears dissolve as we go and life continues, we must remember that everything will be okay. After all, life’s too short to take seriously.

-In its original German, “wanderlust” is defined as “lusting to hike.” Nowadays, it similarly means “a strong desire to travel.” While I normally do not care for the etymology of a word (it tends to be irrelevant), I believe this provides an important clue as to what “wanderlust” connotes. The definitions are basically the same, but in their differences an important subtlety is acknowledged. And that is “to hike” versus “to travel”.

-People often speak of how inefficient and difficult Chinese is. I consider that an understatement. There is no alphabet, so everything is communicated through thousands of distinct characters. Each Chinese person commands a vocabulary of AT LEAST 3,000 characters and 2,000 characters is considered the minimum for fluency. This makes the language quite the challenge.

In addition, the language is tonal. Because Chinese relies on smaller words, it is more difficult to introduce new characters. While compound characters do exist for certain words (like “cell phone” is “shou-ji”), it is also common to pronounce the same word multiple ways to indicate different meanings. In other words, you may think you are wishing somebody a nice day but in reality telling them to fuck off.

This can make for some awkward moments.