7 ■HEALTH 8 9 10 10 tips for healthy & happy summer traveling I’ve developed quite the travel bug this year – traipsing around everywhere from Las Vegas, Portland, San Francisco, San Diego to Barcelona and Paris, and I just found out I’m going to SHANGHAI at the end of the month. Travel can be so much fun but let’s be honest, it can also be super exhausting and leave you feeling like you need a vacation after your trip. I’ve gotten a lot of travel-related questions the past couple months so I wanted to compile a list of my top ten tricks for you guys to help you travel with ease and flow. Let’s dive right in! 1 RELEASE EXPECTATIONS. Do this before you leave, multiple times on the plane and when you arrive. When you completely surrender your pre-conceived notions about the trip, you save yourself from disappointment and allow yourself to be in the present. When you release your expectations and take it moment by moment, you actually get to be present where you are, with who you are with and enjoy yourself more fully. WELCOME IN THE ASSIGNMENTS. One of the reasons I absolutely love traveling is because of the epic amounts of self-growth that happen on my trips. Welcome in these assignments, allow whatever comes up to come up: That guy at the airport frustrating you? One of your travel companions rubbing you the wrong way? Perfect! Where’s the lesson? Use the little annoyances and bumps in your trip to be a space for learning about yourself. COME PREPARED. On a more logistical note, do bring proper supplies! 2 3 For me this means my aloha daily greens, favorite teas, and all-natural toothpaste and toiletries – because we all know most hotels aren’t providing the stuff I use at home. I also bring my crystals, some cards that inspire me and my “infinite love” flower essence spray so that I can make the hotel room a sacred space. I pack myself snacks for the airplane, like homemade chia seed pudding, because there is nothing worse than starving on a plane with a bunch of food you couldn’t be paid to consume. Oh, and lastly, a few good books. LET YOUR DAILY RITUALS GROUND YOU. Yes, I do travel with that huge ACIM book and I do the same daily ritual regardless of where I am in the world. I wake up, make my tea, set out my special things and read my ACIM 4 lesson of the day. I then do a 20-minute or so kundalini meditation. This has become a non-negotiable for me, it grounds me and keeps me centered and connected to my highest self regardless of what chaos may be happening around me. OPTIMIZE YOUR PACKING FOR EASE. Make your life easy and avoid as many minor delays as possible. If you’re going someplace with a pool or beach, pack your bathing suit and beach stuff straight in your carry-on so you can check your bag at the desk and enjoy the sun. If you’re traveling internationally, do research ahead of time and get all your power adapters so you don’t have to go to a bunch of little bodegas 5 in a foreign city. Buy a suitcase that has a unique pattern, so that it’s easy to spot at baggage claim and you never have to worry about someone accidentally snatching your bag. DO WHAT YOU WANT, NOT WHAT YOU SHOULD. Learned this lesson while visiting London in my early twenties. I was running from museum 6 to museum and exhausting myself and then I finally caught myself on the steps of yet another museum feeling super anxious and bummed out. A little voice said to me “what do YOU really want to do?” I wanted to go get a cookie and sit in St. James Park and read my book. I was only running around to every tourist attraction imaginable because I thought that’s what I SHOULD be doing. Now I absolutely love traveling alone or in small groups because I don’t do the tourist thing. I listen to my intuition and decide how I want to spend my trip. HYDRATE YOURSELF. Come on, even little miss holistic lifestyle coach over here needs to constantly reminded myself that I need to drink a lot of water when I’m flying. Yes, even if that means being the most annoying window seat passenger and having your row get up five times during a flight because you’ve drank a gallon of water. Better hydrated than not! Also, when eating food that I’m not familiar with while traveling, water really helps me flush it through. LEAVE TIME FOR REST. You are on vacation and even if you are not on vacation – if you are traveling for work – it’s still incredibly necessary to make time for rest. When I was younger I used to be obsessed with soaking up every minute in a different city and felt like it was a sin to sleep. Now I know that I’m in a better place and will be the best version of myself when I’m fully rested. Much better to sleep till noon your first morning in Paris than to ruin an entire week feeling sleep deprived in a beautiful place. WRITE A RECAP. I’m so lucky to have a blog and an active journaling practice to really help me soak up every morsel of a foreign city. I love reflecting while I’m there about what’s coming up for me, what the experience is like, as well as writing on the airplane home or back in my bed about what I learned about myself. Even if no one is going to read your insights, it’s a beautiful way to really cement the things you’ve learned in your subconscious. GIVE YOURSELF TIME TO RECALIBRATE. I’ve messed this up enough times so that you don’t have to. You will, I promise, come crashing down in the next week or two if you don’t give yourself a bumper of a day or two when you get home to just relax and recalibrate. I went straight into client meetings after my San Diego trip and it took me a long weekend to get myself back to normal. Sleep is sacred. Cassandra Bodzak is the happy, healthy living guru featured on ABC’s “The Taste.” She started GoSweetandSkinny.com, where she shares her healthy recipes and tips for living your happiest life, and is the proud author of “Juicespiration,” her no-nonsense guide to do-it-yourself juice cleansing. She works with clients all over the U.S. to help them stop dieting, start eating right and achieve the body and life they love! CASSANDRA BODZAK Photo by iheartparisfr photgraphers
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