Take me to the river. Széchenyi Chain Bridge, Budapest.
Back in the fourth grade one of the assignments given to my class was to research the history of a country. I wanted England. I was nine years old and I was really into English novels and all things British. England was mine.
The teacher passed a hat around and asked us to pick a folded slip of paper from it and pass the hat to the student behind us. My turn came and I dipped my hand into the hat, closed my eyes and willed England. Instead, I got Hungary and the only thought that went through my head was—you gotta be kidding me (actually it was something else).
I asked my teacher if I could swap Hungary for England. She said, no. She was the teacher, I was the student, and this was Catholic school. Back then, no really did mean no. So I had myself a little pity party on the way home, got over my bad self and sucked it up that I was stuck with a country that I had no interest in, much less to write about.
I thought of that experience recently when I met with a group of travel counselors to discuss the value of them writing about their travels. Many of them don’t think that they can write or they’re uncomfortable with the idea of it. For others, there’s no interest or they just don’t see the value in it. I get it, it’s not what they signed up for, it’s not in “the box” that’s their profession. Throwing foreign stuff into the game of what we do every day and what we think we know can be startling and icky.
Recently, I wrote an article about developing your skills and interviewed career coach Kathy Gonzales. She told me, “The thing that repulses you has gold inside.” What exactly does she mean by that? Basically, that we put roadblocks in front of ourselves that might prevent us from seeing an opportunity. We assign an “ugh” instead of awe to an opportunity. She also offered this advice, “Do something that you don’t want to do. Do something that you’re afraid to do because in the process of doing that you’ll open yourself up to removing certain blocks, you’ll open up perspectives, and you’ll learn something new. Mostly, you’ll learn something that you thought you knew but don’t know.”
I get that doing something you don’t want to do is uncomfortable. I also know that travel agents who take the first step and put pen to pad will discover a world inside themselves they didn’t know existed. They’ll see the gold.
I reluctantly researched Hungary and the more I learned, the more I burned with curiosity about the place. I begged my mom to make goulash but that wasn’t happening in our house. In the end, I turned in my paper and turned out an A+. It felt good, I felt good, I was on fire.
Decades later, I found myself in Hungary gazing at the magnificent stone, Széchenyi Chain Bridge that reaches over the Danube River connecting Buda to Pest. I felt a connection to this place. I also remembered my stubborn, younger self. Funny how things shake out.
Yea, sometimes we have to push ourselves kicking and screaming into doing something we don’t want to do it. But try it. Give yourself a chance. You just may discover you’re on fire.
PORTS ARE CALLING 