Thoughts on travel, life ... and that baseline 20%

In life, as in travel, willingness to invest a little anticipatory time and effort pays big dividends. It may sound like a lot of work to read, learn, think, wrestle, and plan for a trip in advance. Even just a bit. And in some ways it is. But the painful reality, as people wiser than I have observed, is that failure to plan is a plan to fail.

Even a small amount of energy invested in advance profoundly enriches the actual experience once you are on the ground, enabling you to travel (and live!) proactively instead of reactively. Explore and experience a city or region on your own terms, rather than simply have it "happen to you." Discover things others will likely miss. Make the most of your time once you're there. Maybe even have more fun along the way!

Some of us love to really go at it, explore all the options, push out the possibilities before we even get there. We are wired to live that way, and find it life-giving to do so - while others who are wired differently may look on with dismay, and feel exhausted just observing the process. They innately expend their life-energy in other ways, equally valuable but different, which is a topic for another day.

The good news - even for "those people", you know who you are! - is that the 80/20 rule obtains here, in spades. 20% effort expended in advance, even if the process is somewhat unnatural for you, will produce a bountiful 80% return.

Some may be innately inclined to press on, push things out, invest 60%, 90% - or even "110%" effort, whatever that really means. If that's you, you know what it means, and you're "all in", because that's your default mode with this kind of thing. If that's not you, you don't even want to think about what it might mean :-), which is fine.

Or, you may choose to function that way in other areas, but not in the realm of travel. Which is OK as well. But travel has a way of reminding us of these and other inescapable, life-shaping realities. And we tend to notice them more, when removed from our familiar props and settings.

However, no matter our innate style, each of us will find that a proactive, up-front, baseline 20% investement yields disproportionate rewards, over time. In travel, and in life.

In both areas, choosing not to do so means you will, more often than would be necessary, find yourself in situations where you realize you have no clue what is happening and how to resolve it. You will thus be forced to react, and/or find someone else to do the thinking for you, for better or for worse. But in either case the choices you're left with at that point will likely be less than optimal.

Or, alternately, you can invest a baseline of effort, in advance. Which allows you - later, in the heat of the moment - to draw on even basic prep work with minimal effort. When and as needed, you'll be able to tap the right resource ... have just enough at hand to be able to choose how to respond, rather than react. You'll be equipped and empowered to choose. You'll find that you can "lean in" rather than break and run for cover. Situations that might otherwise lead to meltdowns, or become experiences you'd be happy to just survive, can actually morph into enriching markers on your life-journey.

They might even grow beyond travel-survival stories that are fun to tell at a party, into stories that people around you find encouraging, inspiring, even useful on their own journeys, down the road.