We often think of travel as an escape: a break from the ordinary, a reward for hard work, or a chance to see something new. But in therapy, travel can hold another meaning entirely. It can act as a liminal space, a threshold between who we’ve been and who we’re becoming.
When we leave home, we step out of the web of habits, roles, and expectations that quietly define us. The rhythm of our mornings changes. The familiar people and places that anchor us disappear. We’re confronted not only with new landscapes, but with new versions of ourselves.
As a depth therapist, I’ve often seen how these experiences can open us to insight and transformation. When we return, we’re rarely the same — yet the challenge lies in integrating what was awakened while away.
Travel as a Liminal Space
In depth psychology, a liminal space refers to an in-between place: a threshold where the old structures dissolve before the new ones take form. Myths are full of these moments: the desert, the forest, the sea voyage, the dark night of the soul. Travel can function in much the same way.
When you leave the routines of daily life, something softens. Your nervous system recalibrates. You may find yourself more observant, more alive to detail, more spontaneous. Old anxieties or identities loosen their grip. You might notice what truly nourishes you, and also what drains you.
These experiences aren’t always comfortable. Sometimes, the liminal phase feels disorienting or raw. But it’s within this discomfort that self-knowledge can deepen. You meet parts of yourself that were hidden beneath the noise of your habits: the part that longs for stillness, for creative expression, or for a slower way of living.
The Psychological Benefits of Time Away
From a therapeutic perspective, time away can support healing in several ways:
1. Interrupting Old Patterns
Our daily environment often reinforces our emotional patterns: perfectionism, over-functioning, avoidance, people-pleasing. By changing context, those patterns lose their automatic hold. You may realize you feel calmer without constant productivity, or notice how quickly you reach for control when plans shift. Awareness begins here.
2. Nervous System Reset
Many clients describe travel as a nervous system “reset.” In depth therapy, we pay close attention to how safety and openness are felt in the body. Time away often allows for parasympathetic restoration including a chance to rest, breathe, and digest experience rather than constantly brace for what’s next.
3. Perspective on Life Themes
Distance brings clarity. Whether you’re walking a quiet street in another city or watching the ocean, you may suddenly see your life’s patterns from a wider view. What has been asking to change? What no longer feels aligned?
Such perspective doesn’t always appear in the therapy room alone — it often emerges when you momentarily step outside your own narrative.
4. Symbolic Rebirth
Many ancient traditions viewed pilgrimage, retreat, or journeying as symbolic death and rebirth. You leave behind the old self to encounter something sacred and return renewed. Even modern travel can echo this archetypal movement. You might not climb a mountain or cross a desert, but internally, something rearranges. You shed what’s outdated and make space for what’s next.
Integrating What You Learned
The hardest part of travel, therapeutically speaking, is often the return. Once home, the gravity of routine pulls us back into old grooves. The liminal insights begin to fade.
That’s where integration becomes essential. This is the process of weaving new awareness into daily life so it becomes lived, not lost.
Here are a few reflective journal prompts I often share with clients (and use myself) to help anchor what was discovered:
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What rhythms or rituals from your time away do you want to weave into your everyday life?
– Maybe it’s slower mornings, more time in nature, or unstructured evenings that allow creativity to breathe. -
What felt nourishing? What felt depleting?
– These sensations are the body’s compass. They point toward what supports your aliveness and what quietly drains it. -
How did the time away give you perspective on your current path, relationships, or priorities?
– Sometimes a few days of distance reveal truths we’ve been too busy to notice. -
What is one internal shift you want to protect and honour as you return to regular life?
– This could be a sense of calm, trust, openness, or confidence that emerged in unfamiliar surroundings. -
If this trip or experience planted a seed in you, what does that seed want to grow into?
– Every journey holds a message or invitation. The question is how you’ll nurture it once you’re home.
Bringing the Journey into Therapy
Therapy is, in many ways, another kind of journey; one that is similar to travel’s liminality. Both require courage to leave what is familiar, and curiosity to encounter something new or unexplored.
When clients return from travel, I often encourage them to reflect symbolically:
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What archetypes did you meet? (Eg. The Wanderer, the Seeker, the Artist, the Orphan?)
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What emotional weather did you experience? (Eg. Freedom, longing, loneliness, renewal?)
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What was mirrored back to you about your current life story?
These reflections can deepen therapeutic work by connecting outer experiences with inner meaning. Whether through dream analysis, journaling, or depth therapy dialogue, we explore how the “journey” continues inwardly long after the plane lands to return you home.
The Call to the Journey, Even at Home
Not everyone can pack a suitcase or travel abroad. But the essence of travel (the willingness to step outside the known) is available anywhere. You can create small liminal moments in daily life:
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Take a different route home.
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Spend a day offline.
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Visit a new part of your city.
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Try sitting in silence and noticing what arises.
The goal isn’t escape, but encounter. Encounter with life, with mystery, with yourself.
When approached consciously, travel (literal or symbolic) becomes a mirror that reflects back who you are and who you’re becoming. And through reflection and therapy, those insights can shape a more authentic, intentional way of living.
Every journey changes us, not because of where we go, but because of how we return.
The liminal space of travel reminds us that transformation is possible when we allow ourselves to step into uncertainty. In that space between departure and return, between old and new, lies the potential to remember what truly matters.
As you unpack your bags, may you also unpack your growth. And may you keep weaving the soul of your travels into the fabric of your everyday life.
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Meet Rebecca Steele, Registered Social Worker, Psychotherapist (MA, MSW, RSW, CCC)
Rebecca is a Waterloo-based trauma therapist offering virtual counselling across Ontario. With over a decade of experience, she helps adults navigate trauma, anxiety, OCD (including “Pure O” presentations), and self-esteem. Her insight-driven depth therapy approach supports self-understanding, emotional healing, and lasting change. Book an appointment or learn more about her online therapy services.
Located outside Ontario? You can explore Rebecca’s coaching and consulting offerings here.
