Let’s face it: Travelling takes planning, is expensive, and, depending on where you’re going and who you’re going with, can be a little nerve-wracking. Your Instagram feed may be the thing that’s giving you wanderlust, with that one rich friend or overpaid celebrity posting an endless stream of everlasting blue skies and pristine beaches - but to take the plunge yourself, to leave your couch and embark on your own trip is an entirely different story.

So why is it so important for you to do it anyway? Why is it is so incredibly essential for you to travel when you’re young?

In your youth, you will make choices that will define you. What you choose to do now will alter your thoughts and beliefs and travelling will change you like little else can. It will put you in places that will force you to care for issues that are bigger than you. If you go to southeast Asia, you may encounter the slave trade and major degradation and prejudice towards women . If eastern Europe, you may see the effects of genocide and religious persecution. Travelling gives you perspective - meeting ‘regular’ folks from exotic cultures will teach you that the way you look at the world (perhaps through the lens of mass media) is not the way everybody does. The world is so much more than what you can see where you are sat. Talking to people and experiencing it for yourself brings a healthy dose of reality to your so-called higher thinking. You will feel more connected to your fellow human beings in a deep and lasting way and you will learn to care.

This is not about being a tourist. It’s about experiencing true risk and adventure so you don’t have to live in fear for the rest of your life. It’s about developing a sense of excitement, and later you will come to appreciate that you experienced that sort of stimulation of the senses - besides, you’re not going to think back fondly to that time you sat in front of your HD TV, staring at pictures of Mykonos for a week. That’s not really a story to tell is it? But ziplining over the jungle canopy or a speedboat ride in the clear seas of New Zealand allows you to get a feel for what being an active human being is like. The need for adventure is hardwired; travel lets you tap into it.

So what, then, will it be? What choices will you regret making? Holding back. Being afraid. Making excuses. Not taking more risks. Waiting.

You should take the time to see the world and taste the fullness of life. It’s worth whatever investment or money or sacrifice of time that may be required on your part. Everything will be worth it when you’re standing on top of that mountain with the breeze blowing through your hair and you can look down on the world and know that you’ve made it.

[Picture from: Tripod Diaries]

Have I persuaded you to go jetting around the world then?