The Traveling Social Worker

I'm sure that travelers can recognize the sentiment, that maybe after some time, it feels as though you put your life on hold at home. It's not a bad feeling, or a good feeling, simply a parallel feeling that there are two lives being lived, and one can easily be paused while the other continues. You have a travel life and a home life. The world carries on. Your family and friends' lives proceed. Maybe you wonder if you being there ever made a difference. Certainly it did, however the thought can creep up on you. Maybe there is nothing you miss, and this disconnect concerns you, or, better yet, thrills you. Maybe you become jaded from a life away from home, constantly having to reaquaint yourself with surroundings - always introducing yourself, having the same conversation over and over. Maybe all of this causes you to miss home, or maybe the fact that you don't miss home at all makes it feel as though it isn't your home anymore. Time no longer exists, only the day to day - money, and basic necessities. You had an education you might not be using, things you did and were passionate about before that don't matter anymore or that you don't have access to. With new knowledge comes new passions, and new passions can make a whole new persona.

When I originally left on this trip more than ten months ago, I justified my abandon by saying that traveling will enhance my career as a social worker. It will give me insight to all kinds of ways of life - cultures, ethnicities, and beliefs that exist around the world. The mere ability to say a couple of words in someone else's language can strongly enhance rapport when empathizing with clients of all diversities. I said to myself, I will volunteer in other countries to help me get by, and that will support the building of my resume during my extended absence.

After receiving my masters degree in social work, I had a few months to put my affairs in order before deciding to leave for a prolonged period of travel. A period that, in time, became more and more drawn-out. So far I am four months beyond my personally advertised return date. By the time I actually do return, my originally planned trip will have more than doubled in length. Spontaneity is a beautiful gift, considering that concrete travel plans are as real as a "worse case scenario." Everyone can imagine how it will go, but no one sees it come to pass the way they envisioned. Definitive travel plans on extended journies never follow through, and only seem to prevent incredible opportunity. I learned this a long time ago, and for the most part, threw limits, expectations, and deadlines out the window.

As freeing as it has been, lately I have felt as though I put my entire career on hold to travel the world. I can't help but recognize that, at times, my experiences are more for personal gain than they are for educational knowledge that will 'enhance my career.' Since most service opportunities on this side of the world require the volunteer to pay for participation, the idea of building my resume abroad became distant and virtually unrealistic. Sixteen months of "unemployed traveler" may not be the best way to sell myself to the next employer. Certainly not with the argument that such a long absence may have caused me to become out of practice.

All of these thoughts about my absence, and abandon, had been rushing in as a full year of travel rapidly approaches me.

The other day, a symbolic gift was sent my way that would later bring me towards feelings of fulfillment and purpose. I received in an email a post-test survey concerning my graduate degree specialization in integrated primary and behavioral healthcare. As I completed the questionnaire I found that most of the examining questions went as follows: On a level of 1 to 5, rate how confident you are in working with clients of different cultural backgrounds (1 being not confident, and 5 being extremely confident). Topics included; communication using nonverbal behaviors, racial identity, language barriers, educational background and interests, gender role and responsibility, role of elders and children, recognizing your own personal values and beliefs and preventing or resolving their intrusion into practice, comfort when entering a culturally different world, similarities and differences between cultural groups, clients refusal of treatment based on beliefs, need for cultural care preservation/maintenance, cultural sensitivity, dealing with racism and prejudice of clients while maintaining a non-bias practice, religious conflicts, values, etc. etc. etc.

About halfway through I began to laugh out loud at my previous concerns over 'enhancing my career.'

Maybe I am no longer in a therapeutic group setting - teaching mentally ill women how to appropriately cope with feelings of anger while living in a homeless shelter. Maybe I am not doing one-on-one private in-home therapy with hospice clients. Maybe I am no longer doing in-home structural family therapy with troubled youth and their parents in the struggling heart of Brooklyn. What I am doing is communicating on a daily basis with people from around the world, learning about religious and cultural practices, coping with my own discomfort in rural and suburban underdeveloped settings to the point where there is no discomfort, understanding the basis of my values and how they differ from the people around me, learning about wars and racism between ethnicities I didn't even know existed, using different languages, seeing firsthand the daily practices of different cultures, understanding traditions and ways of life, experiencing fundamentally complex and corrupt governmental effects on citizens, living in other peoples' homes, practicing different religions, teaching about love through my own openness, etc. etc. etc.

After taking the post-test, I realized, I haven't left a life on pause somewhere. There is no "home" to go back to or life I left behind. There is no extended "absence." I have never been more present. I am home, everywhere I go. I feel it is a gift to be able to say that even after traveling to 43 different countries in my life, and counting. I can find comfort in anything or anyone, in myself, and at any location. Life before travel, is simply that. It's not continuing on its own - there is still a life being lived. This concept of living a paradoxical double life doesn't exist. People at home will go about their lives, as travelers go about theirs. We will grow in our way, and they will grow in theirs. At the end of the day, I have captured more in a moment than I could possibly have dreamed of in a lifetime. No matter which way we spin it, it is for personal gain - the kind of gain that will make us better practitioners, friends, lovers, and empathizers. The kind of personal gain that benefits everyone wey meet. Every backpacker must be a social worker to an extent. Every traveler must have this knowledge that enhances any career or relationship they have. It requires an openness, a tolerance, a patience, a self-awareness, and an overall understanding of one's personal role in humanity.

I used to think that when I decide to call it quits with long-term travel, or put it on hold until further notice, that is when I will settle down and begin my professional career.

The truth is, I am settled, and I am practicing social work every day. The important thing for all travelers to remember, is what this survey reminded me. Although we may not be working or volunteering, or even interacting with locals every day - we are spreading wealth and knowledge around the world. In return for satisfying the basic human need to participate in humanity, travelers gain an immeasurable growth and goodness that can only effect positive change within and without themselves now and forever. I dare others to be their own genies, grant their own wishes. As travelers do when they choose to travel, I encourage you to also follow your dreams. It only makes us better at being.

Giving and Receiving in Life and Travel

“Why worry? What is meant for you is always meant to find you.” – Indian poet-saint Lalleshwari

One of the challenges of getting started on a grand adventure, or feeling ‘settled’ or ‘comfortable’ in every day life, is money, and worry.

Everyone I know always has something to say about money. I need it, I want it, I don’t have it, I spend it, it was given to me, etc. Everyone has some kind of feeling about the precious dollar bill.

Although I have always had what I needed, and then some, I have always worried about money. Having enough, making enough, not making any so making sure that I save enough.

Enough for…? Well, to make my wildest dreams come true of course! For my babies that I don’t have, my house that I don’t currently want, my furthering education that I haven’t yet decided on, and the big move that I know I will some day make.

A finite truth, in this life, is that money is freedom. A common misconception, in my opinion, is that money is power. Debate that as you wish, but one thing for sure is that nothing has power in one’s life unless one gives it the power. And what that means, is that when a person gives power to their fears or worries, it becomes the rule of their life. It’s true for anything or anyone in life. For a long time, my holding, saving, and carefully spending, was my way of giving money the power. I hoarded it for myself to rid myself of negative feelings that came from the possibility of lack. Money had the power to make me worry, fear, and sometimes to miss out on what I wanted. When I gave gifts I felt immense join, but always accompanied by worry for the shortage that might come afterwards.

But there never was a shortage. The more I gave of my time, and my money, the more I received those things from others tenfold. The more I said I would have no money, the truer it became. The more I lived as if there wouldn’t be a shortage, the more plentifully I received in the exact way that I wanted or needed.

The less I worried and feared, the less I would encounter things that I had previously worried and feared about.

The trick has become thus; trust in the Universe - trust in the Lord, trust in God – and the supply of the Divine will be endless. God is a bottomless pit of goodness, rightness, wealth, health, and happiness and He/She gives it out freely. All I have to do is ask. In fact, all I have to do is say what I want to be true and give love and gratitude to the world around me while expecting nothing in return. “Fake it till you make it.” (Pretend to be healthy, full of love, happy, abundant, and eventually your life will be made into that. It is tricking the ego into not worrying or fearing by convincing deepest desires – the ego – that it is satisfied. And so satisfaction will be thus.) At least, that’s the method I’ve been trying, and so far, God’s supply has never been short for my Path of Life’s demand. “Knock and the door shall be opened unto ye. Seek and ye shall find” – Bible, Matthew 7:7.

But, “When you knock, [make sure to] ask to see God… not any of the self-appointed intermediaries.” – Henry David Thoreau

The Bible says, “Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap” – Bible, Galatians 6:7. Meaning, whatever one says, or does in this life will return to them. (Karma.)

The message, when it comes to worry and fear, is to live as if it doesn’t exist. Concern for worries or fears attracts or brings on more worry or fears. Instead, I try to take all the power away from it. My concern has always been money, and so to get rid of that concern, I must live as if I am rich! Giving to people left and right, buying what my heart says is needed or desired (with goodness and cheerfulness), and trusting in God to provide me with what is right and good in His time and according to His Perfect Goodness. Then I will be rich, always having what I need or want because, through the Grace of God, there is no alternative other than happiness and abundance. With no worry or fear, that’s what ya get.

In the Orthodox Christian Church we pray at a funeral or memorial for the reposed to live in a place where there is no “pain, sorrow, or suffering.” In this life, none of those things can exist if I give the power to God and not fear or worry. Evil is the word for fear, negativity, and worry. There’s no evil, if I don’t give those things the power over my feelings, my behavior, or my beliefs. Instead I have begun to try hard to hand over all of the power to the Will of God, and the Divine Plan. You cannot serve God (Perfect Goodness) and evil (worry/fear) at the same time. “Ye cannot serve two masters.” - Matthew 6:24

And so, I have begun to throw all caution to the wind. My life is blossoming with love, and fullness. I pray for God to open the way for great abundance, health, and happiness, and give me what is good and right that belongs to me according to His Will. Sometimes I pray for peace and patience, and for God to give me a sign that will help me relieve negative energy so that I can be filled with light.

The funny thing is, that it works. Prayer works, and not because I feel light and pretty afterwards. God literally gives answers that are tangible and solution based – that give me the exact sign or message I need at the exact right time to bring me what is perfectly good and right. Its not really what I think of or what I want, but it is always good and always what God demands I need.

“All things whatsoever ye ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive” – Matthew 21:22

“I tell you, you can pray for anything, and if you believe that you've received it, it will be yours.” - Matthew 11:24

In order to go on my around-the-world adventure, I had to completely release my hold on money. After all, I am going to spend all that I have, and probably more than I currently have, with no intention to work for money along the way.  I’ll volunteer in exchange for housing and food, but I haven’t considered working for money. I want to give of myself as much as I can, and having a job doesn’t feel like Divine Will, it feels like work for money. Its possible that having a job would be Divine Will but I am not seeking one. The right income will find me at the right time.

When I began my trip and people asked me why I would do it, one of their concerns was the money I would be spending. “Don’t you want to spend it on a house? Or save it for your wedding? Or your children?” As I said before, these were reasons I had always saved and attempted at frugality for. And isn't it selfish not to save for my children and their future? But, for some Divine reason, whenever someone asked me these questions, my automatic response was, ‘why worry? I have plenty of time to make it all back.’ Now if someone were to ask I would say the same thing, but I wouldn’t wonder at all why that was my automatic response. Worry is irrelevant. God will supply.

And, “There is a supply for every demand.” – Florence Scovel Shinn

In order to start my journey I had to release my hold on whatever was in my bank account. Seeing the number get bigger over years of odd jobs always made me happy. But now, seeing the number get smaller makes me feel like I haven’t wasted anything, I feel fulfilled and open to the Divine Plan. I haven’t hoarded any goodness. I’m sharing it with the world – and I believe that money is just as much a representation of the flow of goodness as tangible acts of kindness. Keeping, saving, hoarding, or not distributing money in some way feels vain or selfish now. Even saving for my (not yet existing) children feels that way. Of course they will have the right amount at the right time. I’m not the one who makes or breaks their future and neither is money. How can God supply if I don't always trust That He/She will?

But I’m finding also that, just as willingness to spend and keep the circulation of money and goodness flowing in the world can benefit my soul, so can receiving. I am a really bad receiver. I can't take a compliment, and I almost instantly refuse any and all spontaneous gifts offered to me. 'No, no, you keep it.' Or 'Let's split it.' Instead of, 'thank you, that's really sweet.'

“Never turn down a free meal.” – Nasser

A friend I made in Norway gave me the wise advice to never turn down a free meal, and I am taking it one step further. Just as I am meant to give, I am also meant to receive. Even when a poor man gives, I must imagine him prosperous and receiving tenfold, and that is how I can receive with gratitude and humility. Refusing a gift, for whatever negative reason (which it always is) blocks the Divine flow of goodness and leaves the person lacking even more than the gift they originally refused to recieve. Turning down a gift may be the same as ignoring God’s Will outright. How insulting! I think that, maybe, we are meant to receive because we are meant to be grateful, and how can one be grateful if one never accepts anything they are meant to receive? A humble and grateful heart will always receive as much as he/she gives – and so the pattern continues.

Traveling has opened my life to the cycle of giving and receiving – and in doing so I give up my hold on my life and my money. I try to surrender to the Lord, as one might say. And the only thing that I can absolutely expect without a doubt, is that whatever comes to pass will be good and right for me.

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An interesting anecdote occurred in my life after I had finished writing this blog entry. My mom and I arrived in Milan via train from Venice. After exiting the train station we walked to the taxi stand because we didn’t want to walk with our luggage in the rain. While in line, a man who was hard of hearing, was begging for money with a sad little dog that he kept in his carriage. I gave him some of my change thinking I need to give more and not hold onto goodness. A few minutes later I asked if I could pet the dog and he said a lot of things in Italian from which I gathered was something like “you have to pay me 2 Euro to pet me dog.” The gall on this guy, I thought. Annoyed with the man, at charging to pet his sad dog, and because I already paid him, I decided to just fain ignorance saying “I don’t speak Italian, I don’t understand” and move on. Shortly down the line (it was a rather long taxi line) I saw a woman in raggedy clothes begging for money. I thought, I already gave all my change to that guy and he turned out to give me a bad feeling... But I have to have faith that God provides. I have a few Euros, and why would I hold onto it if I know God will provide? So I gave the lady a Euro. To my delight and surprise she was extraordinarily grateful. She lit up like a Christmas tree, thanking me profusely. All I could say was, dios te bendiga in Spanish, which means “God bless you.” As I turned away to rejoin my mom, I thought: she was so grateful, I should go back and give her 20 Euro. I wonder what effect that has on someone begging, to receive 20 Euro. Will she beg more thinking “oh this works” or will she see that it is a sign from God? Nonetheless we were rushed into a taxi a moment later and because I didn’t get to give the woman more money I said a prayer under my breath, ‘God I trust that you will provide what is good and right in abundance for that woman and for me to continue to share Your goodness.’

A few hours later, my mom and I went to a quaint local restaurant a short walk from our hotel. The food was divine and the waitress - who laughed, was patient, and enjoyed our complex language barrier interaction - was full of light. But that’s not part of my anecdote. Towards the end of dinner, a woman walked by our table, bent over and picked up a 20 Euro bill and asked if it was mine. I thought right away that it was, because my pocket was unzipped and had a 20 in it. So I took it. But when I counted the total I realized it was extra, and immediately (for some Divine reason) the image of the woman at the train station popped into my head and I felt her immense sense of gratitude. Foolishly ignoring the sign from God, I thought maybe that the waitress dropped a 20 from the check she just walked by with. I said to my mom, ‘It may be a gift from God, or maybe the waitress dropped it. I will know which it is based on whether the waitress takes it or not.’ The waitress said it wasn’t hers. I realized after some more reflection, that I had written this blog earlier in the day about giving and receiving. And even so, I didn’t claim what God gave me as my own, I tried to re-gift it to the waitress rather than be grateful for it. God was teaching me a lesson. He was thanking me for continuing to have faith after the man with the dog nearly made me doubt, and he was teaching me to recieve as graciously as I was willing to give. I immediately said a prayer, “God thank you for your abundance and for teaching me humility and gratitude. I will claim what belongs to me according to Your Will and trust that you will continue to grant me health, happiness and abundance in Your time and according to what is right in Your Perfect Goodness.”

And that was the end.