Why We Miss Places More Than People

[0:01] I want you to think about a place you haven't been to in years. Maybe it's a city, maybe it's a mountain trail, maybe it's a cafe, maybe it's a country you only visited once. Now here's the strange part. Do you miss that place more than some people that you've met your entire life? wait, no. [0:26] Now here's the strange part. You might miss that place more than some people you've known your entire life. Why? I lived in Moldova for two years, I lived in Indonesia for several months, and I've also visited several countries for short periods of time. [0:51] And I found myself reflecting a lot recently on my time spent in those countries and found myself missing those places long after I stopped talking to the people that I've met there. And that sounds strange because we usually think attachment happens between people, not between people and places. [1:13] So today I want to explore why do we sometimes miss places more than people? And what does that tell us about what travel is actually doing to us? My name is Kiara. I am your host of Put the Guidebook Down. And today we are going to be diving into why we miss places more than we miss people.

[1:48] So when you say you miss a place, what are you actually missing? Most people answer food, the scenery, the flexibility, the lack of work, the architecture, but that's not usually it. But that's usually not it. You need to ask yourself, if I rebuilt that exact city somewhere else, would you feel the same attachment? Probably not. [2:25] Environmental psychology calls this place attachment. People form emotional bonds with locations. And research shows those places become part of our identity. So you're not missing Paris. You're missing who you were in Paris, how you felt while you were in Paris, what life felt like in Paris. All of those are emotions, memories, [2:54] moments that existed beyond our regular daily lives that we built for ourselves. So we're not attaching to the places, we're attaching to versions of ourselves that existed in them during a certain period of time. [3:33] And if you've watched some of my other episodes, we've talked about the life that people crave and why people become digital nomads for certain periods of time or make it their life. It's because they're craving something different or they're creating a new identity for themselves. These are all related.

[3:54] And essentially relating it to how travel creates condensed life. Think about it for a second. Think about your last Tuesday or your last Monday. It's hard to remember, right? [4:15] You're starting to worry, maybe you're forgetting things, you are having problems with your memory, you're trying to figure out if you actually did anything that was noteworthy for you to remember, or maybe you're just spiraling a little bit, and that's okay. But it's normal. It's hard to remember when it's just something in our regular day-to-day. [4:37] But think about it, you never forget. But think about it, it's harder to forget your first day in Japan, your first night out in Rome, your first solo trip, your first solo trip as a new traveler. [4:53] You remember everything with those moments, the feelings, what you did, where you were, who you met, all of these small nuances that you would usually forget if it was just a normal day in your life. So why do some travel memories stay with us forever while entire years of our everyday life disappear? [5:12] And I know this is something that I myself have been concerned about as like a regular traveler and also someone who's just a very type A busy person, and it's hard. [5:23] It's hard to not spiral and reminisce about what I was doing in that pro travel productivity all those other times I was in a different country or just trying a different day-to-day in a different city. But it's normal. Novel experiences increase memory formation. The brain pays more attention when things are unfamiliar. [5:48] And that's how all of these are more easy to recall, because you're in a new location, you're experiencing new languages, tastes, sights, smells. You're just learning how to navigate a new environment. [6:05] And we've talked about how maybe this has started to evolve or change since this really big increase in utilization and technology when it comes to our travel, such as with Google Maps and how that's making us not really pay attention to where we're going or the places you're in, or now how you're so focused on travel content creation, you're not really able to take in those sensory cues to help formulate the memory into the long term. [6:35] But all of this travel experiences creates novelty, uncertainty, curiosity, which means that the brain records more, the brain's paying attention more, the brain is able to recall it more at a later date.

[7:00] And I'm a little bit curious personally on how this might change in the next upcoming years as we start leaning more into this travel personalization, AI travel planning, and how this is really going to personalize our travel experience to be very individualistic, and if that has any impact on our brain recall or memories, but we're not gonna get into in this episode. [7:27] It's just interesting to reflect about, but we should be asking. What if travel isn't more meaningful? What if you're simply more awake while traveling? Because maybe travel doesn't maybe travel change maybe travel changes us because it's one of the few times we're actually paying attention. [7:52] We don't want to miss out on the cafe that was by the fountain or church that we were passing by every day. We don't want to miss hearing the local language on the subway. [8:07] We have that travel FOMO where we need to see and experience everything as much as we can to qualify that our vacation was worth it and thus therefore able to recall it better and reflect that, yeah, I did that when at a later date.

[8:29] So then sometimes in the near fut So then sometimes in the future we often try to chase that feeling that we felt in our original trip. We try to go back and recreate it, or we think, I really felt like the person I wanna be in X location. [8:48] So let me go back and try to reinsert myself into that conversation. And you might realize that. This is not exactly where I left off. Or this isn't exactly the same. This is where we're gonna go a little bit deeper. Have you ever gone back somewhere you loved? Only to discover it didn't feel the same. [9:12] Maybe environmentally I'm referring to, or maybe internally. It just didn't feel like the same experience you had the previous time. Why? You may ask. Because the place wasn't the thing that you were chasing, the feeling was. Maybe you miss freedom, possibility, curiosity, adventure, connection. The place became a symbol of where you experience that and found those feelings. [9:43] And this is something common with a lot of travelers. [9:46] You found that you really opened up or found a new side of yourself when you were going off and backpacking through the Swiss Alps, and you are at a different point in your life, and you're saying, wow, I really miss that feeling that I experienced when backpacking when I was 22 in the Swiss Alps. [10:05] Let me go back and see if I can go to those roots again and feel that again. But it's not exactly the same. You're at a different point in your life. Different experiences up to that point. It may lack the same awe that you felt when you got into arrival. I know I felt this.

[10:23] I had my first year in Moldova. I everything was new. I was super hyper-aware, just trying to take in as much information as I could and learn and just try to make sense of it all and create my own day-to-day in this new life. [10:38] Then when I went back home and traveled for about a month or two only to come back into Moldova later, I was super excited to go back, but only to find out that my feeling was a little bit different. Because I'm not entering back into Moldova with the same unknown levels and life and level of curiosity. [10:58] It's because I knew what to expect at that point. I had been there previously, I had already figured out some of the hurdles that I had experienced in the previous year. It was just like returning to a different part of my life, like a little bit of deja vu replay, but it opened up more [11:17] opportunities for me to compare between the two. [11:20] So it left me not necessarily in the present moment all the time, which I felt with the first year, but going through the motions in some aspects and being like, I feel like this didn't feel how I expected it to be, because I felt super happy in the moment this first time I went to this last year, and then now I already know what to expect. [11:41] It just feels like, okay, yeah, I'm checking off my list again. And everyone's opportunities and experiences can differ here. This is just my personal story. But it's kind of again chasing those original feelings that an experience brought to you. A different point of time in your timeline, in your travel journey. [12:07] So was it the destination, was it Moldova that I was seeking? Or was it the chapter of my life, trying to go back to that high level of curiosity that I experienced in my first year? Because sometimes we don't miss the place. We miss who we were before life became routine again.

[12:30] And this is kind of a travel grief that nobody really talks about. Some places feel like heartbreak when you leave. Psychologists discuss this as place loss. People experience genuine grief when separated from meaningful environments. It's like kind of going through heartbreak, but with a location. [12:52] People say this all the time with study abroad programs, especially if you've been over there for a whole semester. You're literally moving back home to your regular daily environment, and you had those close connections that you built with people in that program. You had established your day-to-day life in this new routine, but now you're moving home. [13:12] You're leaving the country, finishing your chapter of life in the study abroad journey. And it's kind of like culture shock, but it's kind of like whiplash. It's, I don't know if there's a exact term for it, but it's a form of breakup grief that nobody prepares us for. [13:31] We're not talking about what happens after you come back home or what it means to end your journey and how to navigate those emotions. People understand what people mean when they say breakup or losing friendships, but they rarely discuss grieving destinations or a breakup of your travel destination experience or journey. [13:59] And some might say it's because that could be interpreted as a form of privilege. Well, travel is privilege, but it's also a part of someone's journey, pathway, and experience that they opted to. And they should be grateful. And I hope they acknowledge that they are. [14:19] Grateful and appreciative of the opportunity they had to go travel, but for those, they still have to learn how to navigate that grief, those emotions from it coming to an end. So I would love to know: have you ever cried after leaving somewhere? Not because anything went wrong, but because something meaningful ended. [14:40] Please share your stories, experiences in the comments, or if someone could have some knowledge of the term I'm looking for, that's like a travel breakup for a destination, let me know.

But the main question is, if places aren't what we're really missing, then what is travel actually giving us? [15:03] The answer is that travel is giving us presence, an opportunity or space to form curiosity, the chance to be someone different or to try to expand yourself and grow to new horizons as a human. It just gives us possibility in general. The goal isn't returning from travel. [15:31] The goal is bringing those parts that you found of yourself while traveling in these different destinations home with you. Those are your unofficial souvenirs. So then how do we navigate this whole travel grief or this kind of breakup that we're going through with these experiences? [15:55] How do we avoid reminiscing and trying to chase that feeling all the time and just return to the present moment? The first step is to identify what you actually miss in those instances, not the place. What is the root feeling? Identify that. The next step is to recreate part of that feeling at home. [16:19] So maybe that's language learning, walking more, talking to strangers, slower mornings. I know for myself it's language learning, making time 15 to 20 minutes a day to learn a language. Or I've had friends that miss the spontaneity that came with their solo travel. [16:37] So what they would do is they would choose once a week, like they would want to explore a new cafe or ice cream parlor. And without using Google Maps, they would ask people for their recommendations that they met [16:49] along the sidewalk on their walk and try to start the conversation to stimulate they would try to start the conversation to stimulate those kinds of conversations you would have in hostels and to try something new, which I think was a unique approach. It's definitely not for everyone, but you get the point. The next one is journal. [17:12] Journal the question and reflect, who was I in that place? Who were you in that destination? What were you like? What were those feelings that you had? And the last step is asking: how can I become that version of myself again without buying a plane ticket?

[17:32] This is something that I've been reflecting on personally, missing those times abroad and trying to figure out who I am as a blend from all of the knowledge and cultural experiences that I've had. And then how do I weave that into my day-to-day as the individual that I am today? [17:55] It's a lot to process and it requires a lot of reflection, which means going deeper, and it can get uncomfortable. So don't go too deep at once. Take time, do reflection, and figure out what works best for you. Because everyone has their own journey. Maybe the reason we miss places more than people isn't because places matter more. [18:19] It's because places become containers for some of the most alive versions of ourselves. Travel isn't powerful because it shows us somewhere new. Travel is powerful because it shows us a version of ourselves that everyday life often hides. And maybe the challenge isn't figuring out how to get back there. [18:38] Maybe it's figuring out how to bring that person home. If this episode resonated with you, I would love to hear your story, thoughts, or comments in the chat. Otherwise, please like, comment, subscribe to our channel and our podcast. [18:54] We're looking to find our community and group that resonates with how we can look at travel in a different light and go deeper than just the surface level our current tourism industry provides. Thank you so much everyone for listening and tune in to our next episode. Bye.