I’m 37 years old at the time of writing this in 2023. Sitting alone in a 50th floor Airbnb in Bangkok. Two months ago, my boyfriend (well ex-boyfriend now) and I left from Cancun, Mexico on a flight around the world. The trip was supposed to be three months long. We would start by flying from Mexico to Germany, spend a week there, then head to Paris for another week. We would fly from Paris to Stockholm and take a cruise across the Baltic Sea to Finland where we planned to spend 10 days before flying to Istanbul for another week.
We DID all of that, minus the Baltic Sea cruise, but that’s another story. It’s in Istanbul where things came to a head, and our lives would split into two separate paths. You see, we had been together just over 2 years and while I did love him very much, I honestly just felt like we wanted two different ways of life. I wanted a nomadic life of world travel, and he wanted to settle down in one place and get a dog. I also wanted to be alone, which sounds a bit off, but that is genuinely how I was feeling.
The week before we made it to Istanbul, we had been in Finland, and I just had this feeling that it would be better if I continued the trip by myself to Asia. Not just better for me, but I knew that… let’s call him John… John was deeply missing his job and family back in the US.
Prior to meeting me John didn’t have a passport. His experience with international travel or a nomadic lifestyle was nonexistent. This whole 3-month round-the-world trip was my idea, and he was just coming along because he loved me. Moving to Mexico City—also my idea, and John left his job so he could come with me. I could just tell by this point in our trip that he wasn’t in his element the same way I was, and that this was not the life he wanted. Additionally, our relationship had evolved into more of a brotherly/fatherly love than romantic. The proverbial writing was on the wall. We needed to break up.
I had a hunch that John wanted to go back home to the US, and the flight from Turkey to Florida is much easier than the flight from Thailand back to Florida. If we were going to split up, it had to happen in Istanbul, and it did.
The first night we were in Turkey, a month into our world trip, I wrote out a script of what I wanted to say while John was taking a walk. It was four pages long. You know how hotels have those free branded notepads in the room? This one was Hampton Inn Old City – Istanbul. I cried while I wrote it. I planned to read it to him when he returned, but thankfully I didn’t do that.
John returned from his walk, and he knew something was wrong. I told him that I felt like our love had changed, that we wanted two different ways of life, and I asked him where he would want to be if he wasn’t continuing the journey to Asia with me. These were all things I had written in my monologue.
It was one of the hardest conversations I’ve ever had. I love John. He is one of my most dear friends, and hopefully always will be. I was so worried that he would be mad at me, feel like I had put him in this situation where we had no control. In reality, it was a beautiful moment in a way. He told me that he didn’t feel like he had wasted two years of his life with me, and that he found a lot of value and happiness in the times we spent together. Truthfully, this is exactly how I feel. Perhaps, I am just not the type of person who WANTS/NEEDS to have a partner. I am very happy on my own without a romantic companion. I cherish the deep connections I have with my friends and family, but predominately I prefer to just be out in the world alone with my thoughts.
So, John left Istanbul flying West–back to the United States, and I left Istanbul flying East for Oman. In a matter of about 2 days, we had the conversation, and then I was alone for the first time in years—and I liked it. I LOVED IT. I felt a sense of freedom, and not sexual freedom, but freedom with my time and energy that filled me with happiness. I LOVE BEING ALONE is the title of this website and blog. My hope is to share my stories about my solo life and travel so that others might try it and experience that same joy.
Having a partner and traveling with them is great– for some people, maybe most. For other people, we are much happier just doing things on our own. We live in our heads with our thoughts, and we don’t crave having someone else there with us. We prefer to just be alone most of the time. If that describes you, then you will likely find some joy following along with my adventure through life. Perhaps I will inspire you to try solo international travel, which has been the most rewarding part of my solo life.