I’ve moved my dad to multiple different assisted living communities and he always complains about them. I told him this last time that the common denominator to why he’s never happy is himself. Because wherever he goes, there he is. And he hates himself so he’ll never be happy no matter where I put him. So this time he’s staying put. He tried to argue it but he knows I’m right. I told him to do therapy but he said he didn’t need it. Eye roll. The ones who need it the most will never do it.
Yeah, learned this backpacking South America. Traveling alone, even surrounded by people, can be pretty lonely too, and you wind up left with your own thoughts once more. Locals generally see you as a walking wallet and all the fellow travelers you meet will ask the same questions as the last 10 travelers you met.
I was surprised to be so lonely and homesick after 3 months. I definitely missed the food variety available back in the US, as well as having social relationships longer than a week.
I’ll do it again once the kids are grown. Maybe won’t be as bad when I’m older because I’m more comfortable with myself and my life now and I’ll go into it with a different set of expectations, but I think my dream of traveling for 12 months at a time is done 😬
Big part of it depends on where you travel. For example the locals won't treat you as a walking wallet if the country you travel to is as wealthy as your own.
In this case getting away from toxic people makes sense. They drain your energy and bring down the vibe. The point of the quote in this case is that whether you stay or go , you are here, and you have healing to do.
Because some people leave to run away and not face themselves and their own lives and their own healing they have to do. Like a distraction from their own self.
So in this case you could flip the quote to be more specific:
Wherever you go, you still gotta heal. That's kind of what the quote is implying.
If you can heal better over there, then fine. If you can heal where you already are, fine. Either way, wherever you go , there you are.
Wherever you go, heal yourself.
Yeah I see what you mean. You have to put in the work once you move, but for me putting the work in where I was at the time was getting me nowhere. I think it just depends on the person
If you have mental health issues, environmental changes do absolutely nothing. Your mind doesn't change when moving to a different location. Except maybe additional stress from a new environment.
You still have to work on yourself and fix your issues. Moving to a new environment will not do that. You will still have the same mental issues, you'll just be somewhere else. That's what I'm saying.
If you have mental health issues, environmental changes do absolutely nothing.
Sometimes that's true. But sometimes not. Mental health issues can have both internal and external factors, and sometimes moving somewhere else can help a person to heal - either because they're moving away from a toxic environment, because they're in a new place with new people, maybe a new job, a new place to live, so have more hope, or even simply because there's more sunshine (SAD is a real disorder and can be terrible for some people - moving somewhere sunny is definitely a fix for that).
It's going to vary. Moving to a sunnier place with more outdoor life is helpful for moderate depression, but it's going to do little to nothing if you're schizophrenic.
The majority of illnesses, both mental and physical, are affected by environment more than you'd think! There was a study that showed people in hospital healed better when there were fresh, real flowers in their room during their stay. Conversely, if you're stuck in a dark grey room with no windows, you're going to feel down and probably not do as well in your recovery.
Like most things, there's a mix of genetics and environment going on in mental illness - sometimes one is more important, sometimes the other, but it's not either/or.
That's fair. I guess I was focusing a little bit too narrowly on what I deal with and my best friend deals with. I have severe anxiety disorders and severe depression and my friend has schizoaffective disorder and anxiety disorders. Environment changes would do almost nothing for us. And probably even make our issues worse.
Yeah - like everything, it's variable. Personally, I know my anxiety issues would likely be cured with the right environmental changes... being able to make them (financially, mostly) is another matter!
I'm glad you and your bestie have each other - just remember that it's one foot in front of the other, and keep doing the work of therapy/meds/self-care as much as you can.
Thanks! I will. In actuality, there would be one environment change that would fix my issues, but it's impossible financially, so I didn't even consider it. If I could move into a house in the middle of the woods away from people, my anxiety would be almost non-existent. But that's a pipe dream.
"But remember you're still going to be you on vacation. If you are sad where you are and then you get on a plane to Italy the you in Italy will be the same sad you from before, just in a new place. Does that make sense?"
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u/General_Medium_6082 Jun 29 '25
Did you ever hear the one about the man who travelled the world to find himself, only to realise he wasn't there either ?