Notes From a Neuro Nerd: The Science Behind Living Your Best Life
Welcome to Notes from a Neuro Nerd, where brain science meets practical tools for living with purpose, clarity, and joy. Join Monica—a certified life-purpose coach and neuroscience enthusiast—and her partner, Austin, as they explore the mindset shifts, habits, and tools that can help you build a fulfilling life.
Tune in to uncover the ‘why’ behind your thoughts and behaviors and get actionable, science-backed strategies to boost your well-being. If you're ready to design your best life, you’re in the right place!
Notes From a Neuro Nerd: The Science Behind Living Your Best Life
67. Personal Stories of Travel and Transformation
What does travel mean to you?
In this special episode, we've invited fellow travel lovers to share their deep connection to travel and what makes it so meaningful to them. These are impactful stories of personal growth and transformative. From mastering multiple languages to embarking on solo adventures, their experiences shine a spotlight on how travel changes perspective, builds lasting connections, and offers a fresh view of the world.
Tune in to listen to these inspiring stories that reveal how travel can open our minds, encourage self-reflection, and even provide a path to healing. Let these tales ignite the spark for your next great adventure!
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Hello and welcome to the profitable Nomad Couple podcast. This is a show where we share all of our secrets about building a sustainable location independent lifestyle.
Speaker 2:We're Austin and Monica. We're a digital Nomad couple here to help you develop an entrepreneurial mindset, ignite your passions and develop a purpose-driven online business.
Speaker 1:Get ready for weekly insights and inspiring stories to empower you to live life on your own terms.
Speaker 2:So are you ready to unlock the Nomad mindset and embrace a life of limitless possibilities? Let's dive in.
Speaker 3:Hey, what's up everybody. It's Monica here, and today we have a super special episode prepared for you. Our goal here has always been to be able to promote different voices in the travel space. We really want this to be a community, so for this episode, we've been collecting stories from other members of the travel community about how travel has changed them. We have several really impactful stories that they share, as well as several reasons that people really like travel and how it has completely changed them as a person. So I really hope you enjoy this episode and we look forward to doing more of these in the future.
Speaker 4:Hey guys, my name is David, I'm from the UK and I'm currently living in Vietnam.
Speaker 4:Traveling has changed my life in a lot of different ways, but I'd say one of the big ones is languages. When I left the UK, I spoke a little bit of French and a tiny bit of Spanish. Now I speak eight languages plus English, and that has allowed me to have some incredible experiences, including the experience that I just had in Japan. So I met this Japanese guy in a park in Bangkok and we became friends and it turned out that he is a celebrity, and so I just went on part of his tour with him and the band and the crew, travelling from Osaka down to Fukuoka, and I went to see the live shows. I ate dinner with the band afterwards and it was just a wild experience that I would never have had if I hadn't left my home and if I hadn't learnt the languages that I have. So I am eternally grateful for the experiences I've had while I've been travelling this world and for the experiences I'm going to have in the future.
Speaker 6:Hi Monica. This is Brittany Vanderbilt. I am from rural Minnesota and I was inspired to take my first ever solo trip to Texas last year because nobody else was available to go on vacation with me. My husband doesn't love travelling he'll do it occasionally but he didn't want to go. All my friends were busy and Minnesota winters can be pretty awful, if you've ever been here. So I decided to just go.
Speaker 6:What the heck? I booked the flight and I went. I actually almost let anxiety talk me out of going and I'm really thankful that I went, because going on this trip by myself even though it was a domestic flight, it was somewhere new and it was nerve-wracking, but it was so fun and it was really empowering and I didn't even get lost like I was afraid I might and it was really great because I feel like that gave me the courage to see that I could travel alone, which meant that I booked a very last minute flight to Mexico earlier this year. It left within 24 hours and I flew on my first ever international flight by myself. I met friends there, but the customs process was a little nerve-wracking. But at least I had that first solo trip under my belt, so I really feel that helped me.
Speaker 7:I'm Hannah Brown. I'm from Placerville, california, and my first travel experience was in high school. I went to Ecuador for a couple weeks to volunteer working in orphanages. So we worked in about five or six orphanages over two weeks. The experience that stands out in my mind, that made me love people and traveling While we were there. It was a boy's birthday. He must have been about seven years old and he got this present and I don't remember what the present was, but it was something that he could pass out and share and that's what he did. This poor third world orphan boy on his birthday shared his present with every single kid in the orphanage that he could. It was incredible and it was touching that he was so selfless when he had so little, but he shared what he had and a treat that I wanted so much I found in an orphan boy in a third world country. That's what made me feel that first travel experience of connecting with people and wanting to learn their stories, and that has really stood with me all these years.
Speaker 5:Hello, my name is Mercedes Labanga. I'm originally from Argentina, but living in Houston, texas. I started traveling around 2008 or so. I worked at the time for continental airlines, so I had flights for free, and at the same time I met my boyfriend. At the time that he was a world traveler, and it sparked something on me. I started traveling more and more. I actually ended up leaving my job to travel for six months around the world and during that trip I encountered the most life-changing and eye-opening experiences of my life, and ever since then I was changed forever and now traveling is part of my life. I do it often, it's my hobby and luckily I have a job that permits me to work from anywhere in the world, but I have as many experiences traveling as a lifetime. I think it's crazy how much traveling opens your mind, how much you learn, how much you self-reflect, how much you meet incredible people and the amount of experiences and stories that we all gather through. Travel is something that you cannot buy with any money in the world.
Speaker 8:Hey, this is Kristi and from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. What inspires me to travel is that it teaches you to get out of your comfort zone, learn to adapt to changing situations, and it allows you to open yourself up to new experiences. As a life coach, I believe that travel can be so transformational, especially when you go into it with the mindset of being open and available to the possibilities that it can offer. Interestingly, I found a lot of healing through travel. I swear I can pinpoint several different trips that I've taken where I've found a lot of healing and clarity.
Speaker 8:One example of this is when I studied abroad in my sophomore year of college. A week into the semester, I lost a close family member back home. It was devastating, especially not being there for her last moments, but I found healing through travel and the support of my friends. During that semester, I also had a realization that started me on a journey of self-discovery, towards finding my true purpose in life. I think getting out of my comfort zone and being away from my regular life and routine helped facilitate this realization. I'm so grateful for that opportunity to study abroad because it helped me grow in ways that I would have never thought possible.
Speaker 9:Hi, my name is Caitlin Harston. I'm from California and I have always been interested in traveling. I always loved the idea of going to new places and seeing new people and different things and experiencing different cultures. My travel experience thus far has not been as extensive as I would like, but a few years ago I had the opportunity to go to Japan with my husband, my sister and her husband, and then my parents. It was incredible. It was an amazing trip. It was fun, first of all, to go with family. That was neat. Then it was amazing to see the places there. The people experienced again an entirely different culture, different religions, exciting places to see and visit. The temples, places to hike. The food was amazing. So that was really neat. My bucket list is full of places to go visit. I'm working on making that happen. That's been my travel experience so far.
Speaker 10:Hi, I'm Brittany Raderstorf, also known as Brent Raider from Brent Raider Photography. My husband and I currently live in Florida. I would say I'm most inspired to travel by all things nature-related. The views from the mountaintops, whales in the sea, the northern lights, the sunrises, the sunsets, the waterfalls and creeks and running water like all things nature-related just fill me up so much, just speak to my soul. What really makes me love to travel and visit new places? It's all about the nature and the views.
Speaker 11:For me, Hi, my name is Betsy. I'm 28 years old. I started traveling on my own when I was 15 years old, unaccompanied, and come from a family Although a small one, as I'm an only child of backpackers. I spent most of my childhood kind of backpacking with my parents around India and Africa and in the back of a van travelling through Europe in my summers. I think this led me to have a real interest in the wider world, Not only personally, but also academically and professionally.
Speaker 11:I went on to study foreign languages and conflict and reconstruction at master's level and now I work in the humanitarian and development sector as a conflict specialist and forest school teacher, which is another story. But I, for the past year, have been working and travelling remotely as a digital nomad within that community. Whilst I wait for deployment with doctors about borders next year, We'll be going to Senegal next week actually. I think that being a solo female traveller and having travelled six or seven continents alone from the age of 15, including some war zones in the Middle East, and having some challenging stories happen to me along the way, both personally and events whilst travelling, have led to an incredible amount of resilience, and also not only my stories but the stories of people who I have met and the stories that I have noted down and taken great lessons and learning from.
Speaker 12:Hey, my name is Christy. I really love to travel. My wonderlust began at 12 years old, maybe. I went to Dominican Republic with my youth group several summers in a row and we actually had to stay in the village. We stayed in little cottages with dirt floors, thatched roofs or tin roofs, no running water, and I found just how exciting it could be in different cultures. We take things for granted here in America and these people they're happy regardless. They always find something to smile about and just decided then and there that travel would always be a part of my life. Not just to go see the iconic places like London Bridge or the Eiffel Tower, but to immerse myself in the culture. And Robert Frost has a poem. Of course everybody probably knows about it. But Taking the Road Less Traveled and that's how I like to travel is really being away from the touristy places and getting to know the people. That in and of itself heals my heart. Just to meet new people and learn about them. Listen, listen and learn. That's that's what I like to do when I travel.
Speaker 13:Hello, my name is Mike Mangelson and I've always had a great love and a great interest of traveling. I'm from California now. I grew up in a couple different places in the United States, but I have always enjoyed being able to travel and visit different places, both domestic and United States, but also internationally, and I think the thing that really I enjoy the most about traveling is being able to see different people, different cultures, different perspectives, and you learn from that that people are different, People have different interests, but they're all just different people and they're still just people wanting the same thing, which is to have a good life. I do particularly love architecture being able to see how architecture reflects societies. I've visited Asia. I've lived in Japan for a couple years and I love the Japanese architecture. I love the buildings there. Have been to Europe a couple times. I love the architecture there. I love seeing different types of people in different types of cultures.
Speaker 14:My name is Wiebke, I'm from Germany and I traveling since I'm a little girl. You probably notice when you're traveling you always meet the German and the reason is because traveling is really rooted in a German culture. You probably heard about the term Wanderlust. It's actually a term called Wanderlust. It's a term that's used in medieval times and Wanderlust, which where people who learned to trade like shoemakers, bakers and so on. They learned their trade and after their apprenticeship they had to travel for three years and work for other people in their field to really learn new skills. And I feel this is like one of the reasons German love to travel so much and I'm really proud traveling is I really can emerge myself in new places, which I never could if I would stay home. I learned new languages and the most fun part is I learned new parts of myself. Like always when I'm new places, I learned something new about myself and I really get to know myself and it's like an ongoing journey to discover myself and this is like the great love of my life.
Speaker 15:If I could say that. Hey there, austin and Monica. My name is Tommy Coder. I live in Columbus, ohio, but I wanted to send you a voice note about your travel post because I am obsessed with traveling. It's one of my biggest passions.
Speaker 15:I have a dream to travel the world. Currently a bucket list to do all the national parks. I've hit a third of them right now. What fuels my travel bug is just being out in seeing the beauty that our world has to offer, being captivated by new places and new experiences and new cultures, and it brings out the curiousness in me and it brings out my willingness to just want to keep adventuring and learn and enjoy life and enjoy all that the world has to offer. I think that life is more enriching when you're out there seeking and adventuring, rather than sitting around and Bree and I hope to get our businesses off the ground where we can work while we travel, and I just recently started a blog and got in the landscape photography and all the other hobbies that trickled down from traveling, because I just enjoy to be out there exploring the world.
Speaker 16:Hi there, I'm Bailey. I'm originally from Colorado, usa, and for the past three and a half years I've been a global citizen. I started my travels because I was young, not happy with the corporate climb I had tried to accomplish and not content with the other options I was looking into. I had an epiphany on top of a mountain while I was solo hiking and realized that I was capable, and at a perfect point in my life, to travel the world. Travel has given me a completely new perspective on the world and how it works. It has unlocked freedom and adventure in the most profound ways. It's given me love and meaning in my life and it's opened my heart and my mind to so many new ways of living. I'm so grateful to be a full-time traveler.
Speaker 17:Hello, I am Becca Stackhouse Morson with with Stacked Intent, and I have always been inspired to travel and go. My parents created this in me throughout my school years as we traveled and went all kinds of places. As my dad had business trips, this led me to always have a travel line on my budget to be able to go as those travel opportunities presented themselves. One of those trips that I went on was right out of high school to China. In, this particular trip created a love to go and see what we may just read about in books.
Speaker 17:Traveling has challenged me to understand there is way more than in our own ecosystems. Another place that I tend to love to travel and always tend to find myself is traveling to lighthouses, and this is to see that the lighthouses shine. No matter what the history that these lighthouses have are usually pretty cool too. Whether they're in commission or out of commission, they are always a fun stop on my travels. They help to remind me that we always have a way to shine through our ebbs and flows in our lives, and traveling is just amazing.
Speaker 2:Thanks so much for joining us here on the profitable Nomad Couple podcast. We appreciate you listening to us today.
Speaker 1:If you enjoyed this episode, share it on Instagram and be sure to tag us. At Austin and Monica, together, we can inspire others to embrace a location independent lifestyle.
Speaker 2:And while you're there, we'd love to connect with you, so make sure you follow us for more tips and inspiration on living your dream location independent lifestyle.
Speaker 1:Until next week. Remember that you have the power to shape your own path. So stay curious, stay adventures and stay connected.
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