February 5, 2020 • 36 mins
Our new friend Daniel Scheffler, host of the Everywhere podcast, shares how traveling taught him that it’s never really about the places you go - what matters most is cultivating diverse human connections through adventures around the world.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
I happened to be a travel writer. Who's you know.
I've been doing this for the New York Times and
publications all over the world and like a hundred and
twenty seven countries now plus and yeah, I use travel
as the vehicle, but you can use anything as the
vehicle for this. It's I like to tap into humanity.
(00:31):
Thanks for joining us on the road to somewhere where
we talk about exploration, adventure, major life change, transformation. It's
about not necessarily knowing where we're going, but having the
faith that the journey will be worthwhile. I'm Lisa Oz
and I am Jill Herzig, and I feel like these
words come up all the time, exploration, adventure, journey, and
(00:54):
really we're talking about traveling somewhere. We're talking about actually
moving from one place to another. You are somebody who loves, loves,
loves travel, would travel all the time if you could.
I feel like I am traveling time. But I mean
you're happy with that, You're happy in that, in that
perpetual state I am, are you not? I mean you
(01:18):
you're the one who's taught me that astrology has some
grounding in something but the same sensor. Okay, well then
that's just screwed up. I don't know what to say,
because I do. I love home, I love nesting at home.
I do love adventure too, though, and as you know,
I feel like, particularly during times of tumult and change
(01:41):
in your life, sometimes it's great to just turn it
even more topsy turvy by traveling somewhere. Well, our guest
today knows all about traveling somewhere, and you can take
us on a virtual adventure around the world as it
all the time. Is a travel writer and host of
(02:01):
the podcast Everywhere, Daniel Scheffler. Am I pronouncing that properly?
You are? You can pronounce it however you wish, Daniel Chef,
it's great. It's the food item coming in the south
of France. Well, thank you for being with us today.
Thanks for having them. You are traveling all the time
(02:24):
like no week. Moss grows on your mos, you say,
and in fact your mossless person. You have just walked
in from the California, California where in California Wria. I
was in San Francisco to go see the j R
exhibit where he took all um. I think it's sixteen
hundred San Francisco nights and he photographed them and he
(02:48):
created a Diego rivera style mural that's digital and moving
in the SF MoMA, and each person was able to
tell their story. So you click on the person on
your iPad and you can see a photo of them,
go and just portrait of them, and also hear their story,
(03:10):
which is just a few minutes, some of thirty seconds,
some somehere like a minute and a half, and it's spectacular.
So I went to San Francisco and then my husband
and I spend a lot of time in Carmel. Our
dear friends own a winery, folk Tele Winery, so we're
always there. So there's actually there's actually a place good
for him. Love him already, um, but there's a place
(03:33):
where you like to go back to. It's not it's
his business partner. So we spend a lot of time
there and I'm always just along for the ride. I
get along with his wife, Madigan, so much that we
just hang out and go to the beach and hike
and big sur and her mother is this probably one
of the most fascinating people you'll ever meet. I could
(03:54):
only wish her on you in small doses, but really
she's the most extreme environmentalist you've ever come across. So
if she came into this room now, she'd shame you
for that plastic pen. She'd be very upset that you've
got a coffee and a plastic thing. It's not plastic,
And I told them no, top. I told them no top.
(04:15):
So she would go to town on us and she
would then recommend we drink our urine. It's good for
your immune system. She's very extreme. I have friends like us,
and she's spectacular. But you can only kind of do
a little bit of maybe time. But but I got
my dose in a big way. She's shaming you for
plastic pens, But how does she feel about you flying
(04:37):
all over the place burning jet fuel. I mean that's
like a radiation exposure to carbon footprint on airplanes. So
what do you say to her? My friend Nick, who
lives in San Louis Obispo, plants a tree every time
I get on a flight. I text him there like
buying indulgces, because it's every single week for you, right,
(05:00):
doing some sort of trip every single you know, I
fly American airlines and I have to um, your status
must be bananas. You must be like I am, like
I am the Ruby Tiara status or something. They have
a secret tier that I can't speak about. Okay, let's
just leave that there. And UM, yeah, you know, I
feel bad about it, and I know that that it
(05:22):
has to change. So I'm starting to try and do
other ways of travel. So I'm using trains, I'm driving
more teslas only Donkey Kanting style. But seriously, I think
that's really I think that's really interesting. So that was
something that theme I picked up on in your podcast,
(05:44):
which has this, UM, I mean your tagline is lose
yourself to find yourself. From my right, that's sort of
the tagline of of you, Daniel Shaffler. That is kind
of how I've lived my life, Like I feel people
misunderstood that when I was younger, and I remember saying that.
I think it's in my UM yearbook, my Metric yearbook.
(06:05):
I think I wrote that and people didn't get it,
and I don't know if I got it, but I
did feel. Like I'm now thirty five and kind of
twenty something years later, i embody that like I do
feel that way almost every day. I'm oh, is this
an opportunity to lose myself in order to find myself?
(06:26):
And losing myself doesn't mean that you let go of
all things. It just means that you're able to question
things and be like, do I need all these material goods,
for instance, and you can reassess that and find yourself
to be someone who's more of a minimalist. Like imagine
challenging every single part of your belief system, your value system,
(06:52):
and and having to defend it. We play this game
all the time called defend the ducor so like. For instance,
in this room, we would say I would have to
choose to defend that incredible light fixture SCons, and I
would give us like a defense. Everyone, Yes, so I would.
(07:16):
I'd like to play that game in a in a
kind of more ethereal existential way too. And travel is
an easy way in It's kind of like a cheat
sheet into that work that you have to do on yourself,
I believe so. Recently I was called elitist and he
(07:37):
seems to think that only people who travel are worthy
or are enlightened or blah blah blah blah. And I
thought about this a lot, right, and a little part
of me does feel that way. Secretly, I'm like, yeah,
fucking everybody should travel, like come on, travel see the world.
But I realized that's my privilege and my elitism talking, right.
(07:59):
So then I've started to reformulate a lot of this
and be like, you could travel down the road. Well,
that's what I wanted to ask you about when you
were saying you were kind of open to change. You've
talked a lot about kind of being a traveler in
your hometown. How does that work them? I mean, how
do you get that same sense of like the curtains parting,
(08:19):
or in your case, like a a re recalculation of
what matters? How do you get that from something you know,
a place that's just mapped with your routine. Well, it's
I think that's kind of easy. You start your day
off quite simply by taking a left instead of a right,
(08:40):
walking a block you never walked. I recently did then
my husband I lived on the Upper west Side forever
and ever, and I walked a block. So I'd go
and take the dog to Central Park every morning with
my best friend, and I'd get that the fastest way possible.
I'm awake. It's a miracle of humanity that I'm awake.
(09:02):
I've had not enough coffee, but I'm marching toward in
Central Park and she's waiting, so it means that I've
got to get there. And then I started to do
this thing where I would just move on a different
block reroute myself. Oh my god, as so many New
Yorkers are screaming in their heads right now, how could
(09:23):
he not go the fastest way? I think it's they're
also on a schedule, and so that is that's also
something that you don't have to worry about, right either's
not a time clock that it was late for you today.
We're doing a different route route here. Well no, this
was just New York traffic. Man. But I feel like
(09:44):
even if it adds a minute or two minutes, I mean,
that's not going to really make it different. But even
if you're on the same street, notice something different. You
don't even have to take a different look up instead
of looking down and see all the there's incredible. The
the rooftops in the freezes along the top of the
buildings in Manhattan were spectacular, So you can see with
(10:07):
new eyes, it doesn't have to be a new place. Well,
that's the amazing thing about audio, right you can listen
to my podcast without having to look at a little screen,
you can. But I think the thing that I you're right,
you can keep walking the same block and seeing new things,
and you will. It's New York City. It's the greatest city.
Look at people. That's right there. It is a safari
(10:30):
around here, which I love. It is a complete safari.
And some of the animals are dangerous. I've been to
keep your wits about you, But at that part I
really love. I have to say I love that. I
love that piece. And it's not it's not just a
New York thing. I mean, humanity's humanity. What's your most
dangerous adventure? Well, I've done lots of those. Um. I
(10:51):
mean some of them are like the obvious, like jumping
out of planes and all that stuff. But I've gone
to Pakistan, which I was in Rajastan in India and
I said to my driver, you know, I'd love to
go hang out in Pakistan for the day. And he
was like, you're crazy, white boy, and I was like, great,
let's go. And I had my South African passport. We
(11:14):
rolled up at the border and they kind of looked
at this and they were like hmm. And there was
like a big talk and the guy came back nervous
At that point, I don't get nervous. I'm not a
nervous person because that's a nervous man. I guess, so
I guess some would be nervous. My mother. I remember
texting my mother and being like, I went to Pakistan.
She's like fantastic, How was it? So? I don't come
(11:37):
from go to North Korea? Please, dying to go? Say
this boy, what do we say? Well, so I go,
I go in and then my guy says, they've never
they've never seen a South African. So the first question
was like South African and then they have to look
it up on a map. And then the next question was,
(11:58):
but he's white. So it started this like fascinating adventure
into Pakistan where they were like this white boy from Africa,
how did you? So people were like fascinated by me.
So you learned a lot about Pakistan before you ever
even crossed the border into it. It was amazing. So
I've done that stuff. You know what happens is I
think you you fall in love and you meet your
(12:19):
person as I have, and you you think differently, like
you slow down and you think, oh, maybe I wouldn't
do this dangerous thing. Because I have something to lose.
Maybel would say death is like that, why do you
find it? She doesn't drive with her seatbelt because why
would you funk with fate? You shouldn't mess with fate.
(12:42):
And I like parts of that, like if it's time
to go, that's the way everyone was in the seventies,
bounced around the back of my parents station wagon, right
they were defined. Yeah they were up for fate. Everyone was.
But now I think I think a little bit differently
at journeying, Like I think a lot about our journeying together. Um.
(13:05):
I have a friend who said to me, these this
amazing thing because the visual is beautiful. You're in your
race car and my wife's in her race car, you know,
so like everybody's in their race car and we're racing
on this track together and sometimes you're racing next to
each other, but sometimes you racing apart from each other.
And I like it. Now I have this visual of
myself in my race car and Michael in his race car.
(13:30):
Yeah we're on the same track. At least you're on
the same track, which I love. But I think the
the difficulty with journeying is that you have to you
have to be willing to let go of yourself of
this belief system. We have this like whether and people
think it's religion. It's not. It's it's a it's a deeper,
deeper belief system. I've spent so much time in India
(13:52):
and in meditation doing vi pasana, which is like a
ten day silent retreat, and that's the thing that always
comes up, the last thing day ten that you're able
to let go of. It's like, why do I have
this strange belief system that no longer serves me? When
we come back, I want to delve into your belief system.
(14:24):
Before the break, we had been speaking with Daniel about
his belief system and letting go of your belief system specifically, however,
you in your podcast have the commandments of traveling, which
is a belief system. Um, it's ironic. Let's be clear,
(14:44):
needed ten, I needed far more. Can we walk through
this before you let go of those beliefs? Can we
just walk through them for the sake of podcast? Well,
they are continuous and will continue I think forever mall.
And they're all phrased by the way everyone as commandments
thou shalt worship all things local that thou shalt know
(15:09):
your starting point, you know. I mean, well, let's take
them one by one so he can. Let's pick a
couple and he can break them down for us. Well,
the one one that I loved just the sound of
it was thou shalt put yourself in the way of magic.
What is that about? Well, firstly, the commandments come in
the positive, whereas I think in the Bible, which I
(15:30):
never shalt not do a lot of things, it's like,
thou shalt not right. And I wanted to make it
a positive thing, like anyone could do this, and I
wanted them to be universal. For instance, thou shalt be generous.
I don't know anybody who doesn't want to be generous,
and I don't want and I don't know anybody who
doesn't want to receive generosity. So I felt like I
(15:52):
wanted to make them for anybody and everybody, regardless of income, race,
where live. Putting yourself in the way of magic is.
It's something that I remember. It's very corny. I rant.
I had a big career in management consulting, and I
washed out terribly, wreckage of myself, and I had to
(16:15):
sort of wash up on the shores of Cape Town,
um emaciated, in black. I'm still in black, but I was,
you know, I was a wreck. So it was truly
your you mean it, it was truly devastating for your personally.
I had a terrible accident in Amsterdam. I fell into
(16:35):
the rach and nearly died. Wait what is that? It's
the canals. Were you in a car on a bicycle?
Of course, Amsterdam, I slipped on ice. It was Christmas time,
so you weren't on a bender and just collapsed into
the course. I was at that time. That's exactly when
(16:59):
I got So it's ten years December, funny time. Well
what I mean now, I've stopped saying I'm so by
Now just say I don't drink and I don't make
any job. It's been the way I've chosen this path
once again. But that's at that time, you were drinking
in your management consultant, almost drowned, and then you fell
(17:20):
into a canal and washed up on the beach in
South Africa. That's it, That's what happened. And um, I
watched Eat, Pray, Love, and there's this moment where Julia
Roberts says this thing about I used to have this
hunger for my life and it's gone. And I got
onto a plane and went to India like the next week.
It was kind of that corny and kind of that cheesy,
(17:44):
and I like that. Like I like that even I,
the cynic, the hardcore could be softened by a soppy
Bryan Murphy movie. It's Julia Roberts. So off I went
and she said something in that book. I love that book.
Actually it Pray Love, because it has some beautiful values.
(18:06):
Even though it's not I'm going to win a Pulitzer,
it could win the hearts. And I quite like that.
I'm a literary snob, so like sometimes I come down
and I read that you know these books of them,
which I which is funny man, and I admire her
ability to do that, and I admire that even I,
(18:26):
the snob, could be moved by that, which means it
was just another belief system of me, the snob I
had to let go of. So she says something about
magic will come to if you're willing to receive it,
and I have kind of thought about that, and I
try and live that every day. So that episode is
(18:46):
about that. It's about magic is all around us, and
it doesn't necessarily mean fairies and Harry Potter, it could
mean any kind of magic. In particular, this episode is
about Estonia, and I went on this incredible road trip
road trip around Estonia, and I kept meeting these incredible
people so in touch with nature, it was unbelievable. Everything
(19:10):
they did was like, well, you either with nature or
against nature. Every moment of every day was spent thinking
about that. There was no evil and good. There was
no good or bad. There was no um must and
mustn't they mustn't. There was no yes or no. There
was just with nature against nature. And I started to
(19:32):
uncover these magical people. I went to the Setma district,
which is eastern Estonia, touching Russia, and I met this
community of woman who it's a woman land community and
they have traditional dress and they believe in creatures of
the forest and being in touch in this way. And
(19:55):
I learned all this folklore from them, and then accidentally
went into Russia. I drove into Russia accidentally across the
bone and there was magic mant too like. I got
held by police by like very scary Russian military and
then um somehow found myself at this like Russian spa
(20:17):
like very stwixt spa like that, like a German kind
of spa where you have a metal table for your
massage table and no oil. No like spa music, just
metal table and some like the police were punishing you
the cross border. It was jail. I went to Russian jail.
(20:46):
We shouldn't kid about that. Ryan girls had a tough time.
That was very bad. No, but your metal table. The
only Russian spo I've ever been to, by the way,
I'll tell you really quickly, they had like a horsehair blanket.
I was so itchy. I was like, please, please be
over and someone was having a should we say not
a massage. It wasn't even a room. It was like
(21:06):
like they were dividers between like and I could hear everything.
It was very I would never go that stitchy in
so many ways. Russia. No, it was in the United States,
but it was. It was Russia. Russian. So anyways, put
that in parentheses, which I love to see people. You
don't have to travel to Russia. You can keep your
(21:27):
carbon footprint light as a feather and have that disgusting
experience right here in America in sheeps. I'm not going
to talk about where it was. I don't want to
insult anyone, but there are there was a bad Russia ended.
But I want to hear more about your yes on
the medal table. Where was the magic in this? Well,
the magic was that the masseuses hands were My whole
(21:52):
body just started to change shape from this experience. This
like giant igor Man came in and mishandled me in
ways that I didn't know my body could move in.
And I haven't had a creek or a problem with
my body since. Well, And if you have a problem,
all you have to do is retrace your steps to
get back to Estonia accipent to go into Russia. It's
(22:15):
sort of arrested escorted back into I think Estonia, and
then find the spot and people look out for the
metal table. SPA incredible You jumped over something magic though
that I kind of want to go back to, which
was India, because you you said, and then I went
to India, everything changes and I end up in Estonia
for this magical experience. Clearly there was magic in that
(22:37):
Indian trip as well, because your life's changed miraculously. Well,
I spend time at an Ushram and you know, I
am a white, privileged boy from Africa that that had
a lot of kind of privilege to work out and entitlement.
You know, I'm a white gay, but still I'm a
white man and a lot of entitlement. I think ms
(23:00):
with that hierarchy, and I have seen that in my life.
I watch how I'm with a group of friends for
dinner and the check will only come to the man
or for some reason I don't drink, and they would
come up to me at a table and hold them
I'm not drinking, just seltzer. Would you like to taste
the wine? I'm like, give it to the woman who
(23:21):
owned it. The wine is life right. And I think
India helped a lot with a kind of peeling back
that entitlement and peeling back that that privilege. And and
I my first trip, I was there for six weeks,
eight weeks, and I cleaned yoga mats and scrubbed flaws
(23:41):
and make dinner, made meals for people, and I didn't
eat until every two and fifty people had eaten at
the ashram. And it did things for me. It's hard
to really explain it until you do things like that,
when you really really put yourself second and you really
(24:06):
just do things out of the goodness and out of
the the kind of essence of who we are. That's
who we really are humans I essentially, I mean I
have been flow with this, but today fine, today, I
believe we're good. Essentially, We're good and we want to
return to that state of goodness all the time. And
USh rams and experiences like that, whether it's a meditation
(24:30):
that you can just do at home, never even leaving
the sofa, can teach you that and tap into that,
and there's magic in that. It's magical that we can
transform ourselves just by tapping into some of those values.
When we come back, I want to tap into into
some more of your wisdom. Before the break, we we're
(25:02):
talking about your commandments of travel, and a lot of
them seem to uh and the wisdom that comes with
those commandments, but they seem to be based in how
we interact with other people. And it's it feels like
much of your travel is not just the place, but
(25:25):
the relationships that you develop in in that travel. Is
that is that a big part of that is actually
so accurate. I'm glad that you get that sense. In fact,
it's not about the place at all. It's about the humanity.
My show is about that. It's about human connection. I
happened to be a travel writer who's you know, been
(25:47):
doing this for the New York Times and publications all
over the world and like a hundred and twenty seven
countries now plus And yeah, I use travel as the vehicle,
but you can use anything as the vehicle. Hoo. For this,
it's I like to tap into humanity. I like the
and this is how the show got created. I wanted
to create something that was not the list. It was
(26:10):
not that you must do best place blah blah blah
blah blah nonsense. It was something about like, it doesn't
matter where you go, it doesn't matter what you do,
it matters who you are. And here's an opportunity for that.
There's there's an episode that I really loved where you
talk about you're in Mississippi and you visited a civil
rights museum, and I think I got this right. You
(26:32):
were looking at sort of the various artifacts and you
found yourself standing next to an elderly black woman and
you just wound up wordlessly taking her hand, and the
two of you cried together. Yeah, so I I mean
that sounds like that. I mean, I'll cry again. What
a profound experience. And I guess I'm wondering but also
(26:55):
extremely rare, but not rare for you. So what is
it that you put out in the world that lets
somebody know not to be afraid if you take their hand,
that makes them feel comfortable crying with you, that bridges,
that breaks down walls, and what do you think it is? Well,
I've been an open person, I think my whole life.
(27:16):
At some point when I was a teenager, I closed
up fully and I kind of battled out my my
battle battleness, and I came out of that in um
and I think a way that that not only opens
me up, but opens other people up. And that's the
that's the trick. It's not about you, it's about everybody else.
(27:37):
My openness is only to open up everybody else. It's
not it's not a selfish thing. I watch how my
husband will be in a room and he'll be like, ah,
someone's going to speak to me, and he like leans
into the wall or like the bar. So there are
habits of openness that and I lean out. I lean
(27:58):
into people and I'm like, I'll tell them something revealing
about myself and people feel emboldened to reveal something about
them all. I stopped by telling people something funny, like
a ridiculous story. The kind of storytellers I'll tell them,
like a hysterical something that just happened. It's always like
(28:18):
off the coffin, just happened, and people will stop laughing,
and then they'll be like, well, you know what happened
to me? My wife? And then dot dot dot and
they tell me the most insane stories, which I love.
But isn't it interesting how how modern travel seems to
be all about enclosing yourself. Luxury is you get to
sit in the front of the plane in a pod
(28:40):
where no one can talk to you. And if you
happen to be traveling with your someone you love, oh
well you're not going to talk to them because there's
like a thick wall of plastic between the two of you.
It's just it seems to me that your style is
completely antithetical to what the travel industry sort of in
(29:01):
some ways pointing us to it. I agree. Therefore, you
have to work harder, that's the point. So as much
as the travel industry or the travel business let's call it,
that is moving us towards more privacy and and um
kind of privatizing our lives. That means you have to
work harder in every other element of your life. And
(29:21):
that's how I take this. So, yes, sometimes I'm up
in the front of the plane and I cannot interact,
but I get up, I go speak to the flight attendant.
I always do that. They all know me American Airlines,
they all know me by now. Um, this morning, this
gentleman who I adore, he's always on the on the
flight to San Francisco. That's he's around. How are your kids,
(29:41):
Moranana wens that when oh, graduating, God, I can't believe
in And we have this funny interaction. Guess what happens
another passenger hears us tell me more and suddenly were
like all chatting quietly, being lovely and kind. But there's
a and look, the flight attendant let you stand up
and get out of your seat for a five minutes.
(30:02):
It's true. So when you go to anywhere, do you
just strike up a conversation with random strangers all the time?
And sometimes you have to have some missus in order
to get some hits right. Sometimes they're real misses, people
that have no idea. But you know, I find that
awkwardness also kind of magical and wonderful. Like some people
(30:23):
cannot tell a story, but I just listen and I
like almost helped them along to tell their story. And
I think they like that. They're like, God, someone's finally
listening to me tell the story. Do you tell them?
I'm a writer and I'm writing about we're in Bangladesh,
And sometimes I totally lie. Sometimes I'm like, you know,
(30:43):
like like ridiculous something and people are like, wow, you
work for the government as an national happy maker whatever.
Like I just make people like double four, Yes, that's okay.
I would be is going to be a game? Could
(31:09):
be you? So like they're covering all the ba What
is the Broccoli family? What's what's the name of If
you're listening right now, we have found your next secret agent.
Movies all over the world have believed, I mean training
it is like Dappa as as. I'm just not. I
(31:31):
just feel like he's small. I have like a I'm
like an alternative guy, like I don't have that tucks.
I can do well. I can do it. Also, you
are quite anti technology, so you would make a bit
of a he'd be a terrible bit of a bad Yes,
even Sean Connery had technology you don't need. Well, you
(31:52):
would probably go for a crazy fast car, but you
do not go for social media. You do not go
for selfies or Instagram or you know. I should be
honest about that. I try not to, but the world
is in a place that it's almost impossible to avoid it.
So I I feel like I like to hop onto
my moral high horse, beautiful, gorgeous, white, um tall horse.
(32:14):
But sometimes I need to be pushed off my horse.
It is true, because it's impossible not to be on
any of these things. It's impossible not to to realize
that it's part of what we live today century, you know,
can you believe that we're going it's the second decade
of the century. And there's something about like if the
(32:36):
president is tweeting and the world is changing by instagram,
you know, political movements are happening. We can't ignore that.
I mean, I'd love to ignore Trump, but but I
I think that it's part of the zeitgeist and we
have to embody that. But we have to embody yet
(32:58):
reject right. So take what you need and move along.
But you're also a travel writer. So people want visual creatures.
We want They want to see what you're seeing. And
the only way to do that is free to be
having taken to me taking pictures and have them and
make them available. And the platform for availabilities Instagram, so
(33:20):
they've got they were going to expect you to share
your adventures with them. I in one of the episodes,
I talk about traveling with my mother to Japan and
Mother's rule is one photo A very fun episode. By
the way, my mother is wonderful. You have quite an
unusual relationship with your mother. I do. We have a
fun we have like we just have fun together and
(33:41):
you skype in your kimonos. Now we do. Do you
know my mother she adopted me. My parents adopted me
when they were faulty, and they were told it was
kind of the last moment they were turning forty at
the time. It was the eight is um you couldn't
adopt after that, and she had given up hope and
(34:04):
it was like that last phone call. So my mother
worships me in that way, like she I came when
she thought that she wasn't going to have a baby.
And my mom is such a she's not a mommy mommy.
She's like a totally different intellectual, Like she spas with
me intellectually, and I'm so grateful. But she set me
on this path of travel, like she was always like,
(34:26):
travel will teach you everything. I can teach you nothing. Goodbye. Um.
But you know, I think, um. I think the the
trick with social media and all of that is we
see too much, right, so we we scroll endlessly, and
I think less scrolling, more pausing. So see one thing,
(34:49):
see five things you don't need to see five things.
So radical curation, So radical, radical curation. I believe in that.
I try and radically curate my friend. I try and
radically curate my time because I can't be in creative
space if it's too much coming at me. I can't.
I don't think that you. I don't think that you
(35:11):
really ponder and take in things if if you don't
spend time looking at fewer things. I'm not saying don't
read you know, books, I'm like, books are plenty, but
be more selective and be and kind of seed life
as your own curation, not what the social media god
(35:35):
small g are giving us, or what the media industry
is pushing down on us. Curate that for yourself, choose it.
So it's like an active choice opposed to UM a
kind of dictation of your life. That's how I see it. Yeah,
well it's great advice and I feel like I'm going
to hit the road with different eyes. I think that
(35:57):
you've definitely given us a new perspective on traveling and
staying at home. So thank you so much. Pleasure is mine,
so so fun to be with you, to be with
you everyone out there. Thanks so much. Subscribe to the
Everywhere podcast with Daniel Shuffler and don't miss um an
(36:18):
episode of Road to Somewhere. The Road to Somewhere is
recorded in New York City. Make sure to share, subscribe, rate,
and review us. We would love to hear from you.
Where are you on your journey? Connect with us on Facebook, Instagram,
and Twitter at pod to Somewhere and email us at
(36:38):
Road to Somewhere at i Heart media dot com. Special
thanks to Alicia Haywood, are incredible producer. Thanks everyone for
joining us on the Road to Somewhere. We're available on
the I Heart Radio app, on Apple podcast or wherever
you get your podcasts.
I happened to be a travel writer. Who's you know.
I've been doing this for the New York Times and
publications all over the world and like a hundred and
twenty seven countries now plus and yeah, I use travel
as the vehicle, but you can use anything as the
vehicle for this. It's I like to tap into humanity.
(00:31):
Thanks for joining us on the road to somewhere where
we talk about exploration, adventure, major life change, transformation. It's
about not necessarily knowing where we're going, but having the
faith that the journey will be worthwhile. I'm Lisa Oz
and I am Jill Herzig, and I feel like these
words come up all the time, exploration, adventure, journey, and
(00:54):
really we're talking about traveling somewhere. We're talking about actually
moving from one place to another. You are somebody who loves, loves,
loves travel, would travel all the time if you could.
I feel like I am traveling time. But I mean
you're happy with that, You're happy in that, in that
perpetual state I am, are you not? I mean you
(01:18):
you're the one who's taught me that astrology has some
grounding in something but the same sensor. Okay, well then
that's just screwed up. I don't know what to say,
because I do. I love home, I love nesting at home.
I do love adventure too, though, and as you know,
I feel like, particularly during times of tumult and change
(01:41):
in your life, sometimes it's great to just turn it
even more topsy turvy by traveling somewhere. Well, our guest
today knows all about traveling somewhere, and you can take
us on a virtual adventure around the world as it
all the time. Is a travel writer and host of
(02:01):
the podcast Everywhere, Daniel Scheffler. Am I pronouncing that properly?
You are? You can pronounce it however you wish, Daniel Chef,
it's great. It's the food item coming in the south
of France. Well, thank you for being with us today.
Thanks for having them. You are traveling all the time
(02:24):
like no week. Moss grows on your mos, you say,
and in fact your mossless person. You have just walked
in from the California, California where in California Wria. I
was in San Francisco to go see the j R
exhibit where he took all um. I think it's sixteen
hundred San Francisco nights and he photographed them and he
(02:48):
created a Diego rivera style mural that's digital and moving
in the SF MoMA, and each person was able to
tell their story. So you click on the person on
your iPad and you can see a photo of them,
go and just portrait of them, and also hear their story,
(03:10):
which is just a few minutes, some of thirty seconds,
some somehere like a minute and a half, and it's spectacular.
So I went to San Francisco and then my husband
and I spend a lot of time in Carmel. Our
dear friends own a winery, folk Tele Winery, so we're
always there. So there's actually there's actually a place good
for him. Love him already, um, but there's a place
(03:33):
where you like to go back to. It's not it's
his business partner. So we spend a lot of time
there and I'm always just along for the ride. I
get along with his wife, Madigan, so much that we
just hang out and go to the beach and hike
and big sur and her mother is this probably one
of the most fascinating people you'll ever meet. I could
(03:54):
only wish her on you in small doses, but really
she's the most extreme environmentalist you've ever come across. So
if she came into this room now, she'd shame you
for that plastic pen. She'd be very upset that you've
got a coffee and a plastic thing. It's not plastic,
And I told them no, top. I told them no top.
(04:15):
So she would go to town on us and she
would then recommend we drink our urine. It's good for
your immune system. She's very extreme. I have friends like us,
and she's spectacular. But you can only kind of do
a little bit of maybe time. But but I got
my dose in a big way. She's shaming you for
plastic pens, But how does she feel about you flying
(04:37):
all over the place burning jet fuel. I mean that's
like a radiation exposure to carbon footprint on airplanes. So
what do you say to her? My friend Nick, who
lives in San Louis Obispo, plants a tree every time
I get on a flight. I text him there like
buying indulgces, because it's every single week for you, right,
(05:00):
doing some sort of trip every single you know, I
fly American airlines and I have to um, your status
must be bananas. You must be like I am, like
I am the Ruby Tiara status or something. They have
a secret tier that I can't speak about. Okay, let's
just leave that there. And UM, yeah, you know, I
feel bad about it, and I know that that it
(05:22):
has to change. So I'm starting to try and do
other ways of travel. So I'm using trains, I'm driving
more teslas only Donkey Kanting style. But seriously, I think
that's really I think that's really interesting. So that was
something that theme I picked up on in your podcast,
(05:44):
which has this, UM, I mean your tagline is lose
yourself to find yourself. From my right, that's sort of
the tagline of of you, Daniel Shaffler. That is kind
of how I've lived my life, Like I feel people
misunderstood that when I was younger, and I remember saying that.
I think it's in my UM yearbook, my Metric yearbook.
(06:05):
I think I wrote that and people didn't get it,
and I don't know if I got it, but I
did feel. Like I'm now thirty five and kind of
twenty something years later, i embody that like I do
feel that way almost every day. I'm oh, is this
an opportunity to lose myself in order to find myself?
(06:26):
And losing myself doesn't mean that you let go of
all things. It just means that you're able to question
things and be like, do I need all these material goods,
for instance, and you can reassess that and find yourself
to be someone who's more of a minimalist. Like imagine
challenging every single part of your belief system, your value system,
(06:52):
and and having to defend it. We play this game
all the time called defend the ducor so like. For instance,
in this room, we would say I would have to
choose to defend that incredible light fixture SCons, and I
would give us like a defense. Everyone, Yes, so I would.
(07:16):
I'd like to play that game in a in a
kind of more ethereal existential way too. And travel is
an easy way in It's kind of like a cheat
sheet into that work that you have to do on yourself,
I believe so. Recently I was called elitist and he
(07:37):
seems to think that only people who travel are worthy
or are enlightened or blah blah blah blah. And I
thought about this a lot, right, and a little part
of me does feel that way. Secretly, I'm like, yeah,
fucking everybody should travel, like come on, travel see the world.
But I realized that's my privilege and my elitism talking, right.
(07:59):
So then I've started to reformulate a lot of this
and be like, you could travel down the road. Well,
that's what I wanted to ask you about when you
were saying you were kind of open to change. You've
talked a lot about kind of being a traveler in
your hometown. How does that work them? I mean, how
do you get that same sense of like the curtains parting,
(08:19):
or in your case, like a a re recalculation of
what matters? How do you get that from something you know,
a place that's just mapped with your routine. Well, it's
I think that's kind of easy. You start your day
off quite simply by taking a left instead of a right,
(08:40):
walking a block you never walked. I recently did then
my husband I lived on the Upper west Side forever
and ever, and I walked a block. So I'd go
and take the dog to Central Park every morning with
my best friend, and I'd get that the fastest way possible.
I'm awake. It's a miracle of humanity that I'm awake.
(09:02):
I've had not enough coffee, but I'm marching toward in
Central Park and she's waiting, so it means that I've
got to get there. And then I started to do
this thing where I would just move on a different
block reroute myself. Oh my god, as so many New
Yorkers are screaming in their heads right now, how could
(09:23):
he not go the fastest way? I think it's they're
also on a schedule, and so that is that's also
something that you don't have to worry about, right either's
not a time clock that it was late for you today.
We're doing a different route route here. Well no, this
was just New York traffic. Man. But I feel like
(09:44):
even if it adds a minute or two minutes, I mean,
that's not going to really make it different. But even
if you're on the same street, notice something different. You
don't even have to take a different look up instead
of looking down and see all the there's incredible. The
the rooftops in the freezes along the top of the
buildings in Manhattan were spectacular, So you can see with
(10:07):
new eyes, it doesn't have to be a new place. Well,
that's the amazing thing about audio, right you can listen
to my podcast without having to look at a little screen,
you can. But I think the thing that I you're right,
you can keep walking the same block and seeing new things,
and you will. It's New York City. It's the greatest city.
Look at people. That's right there. It is a safari
(10:30):
around here, which I love. It is a complete safari.
And some of the animals are dangerous. I've been to
keep your wits about you, But at that part I
really love. I have to say I love that. I
love that piece. And it's not it's not just a
New York thing. I mean, humanity's humanity. What's your most
dangerous adventure? Well, I've done lots of those. Um. I
(10:51):
mean some of them are like the obvious, like jumping
out of planes and all that stuff. But I've gone
to Pakistan, which I was in Rajastan in India and
I said to my driver, you know, I'd love to
go hang out in Pakistan for the day. And he
was like, you're crazy, white boy, and I was like, great,
let's go. And I had my South African passport. We
(11:14):
rolled up at the border and they kind of looked
at this and they were like hmm. And there was
like a big talk and the guy came back nervous
At that point, I don't get nervous. I'm not a
nervous person because that's a nervous man. I guess, so
I guess some would be nervous. My mother. I remember
texting my mother and being like, I went to Pakistan.
She's like fantastic, How was it? So? I don't come
(11:37):
from go to North Korea? Please, dying to go? Say
this boy, what do we say? Well, so I go,
I go in and then my guy says, they've never
they've never seen a South African. So the first question
was like South African and then they have to look
it up on a map. And then the next question was,
(11:58):
but he's white. So it started this like fascinating adventure
into Pakistan where they were like this white boy from Africa,
how did you? So people were like fascinated by me.
So you learned a lot about Pakistan before you ever
even crossed the border into it. It was amazing. So
I've done that stuff. You know what happens is I
think you you fall in love and you meet your
(12:19):
person as I have, and you you think differently, like
you slow down and you think, oh, maybe I wouldn't
do this dangerous thing. Because I have something to lose.
Maybel would say death is like that, why do you
find it? She doesn't drive with her seatbelt because why
would you funk with fate? You shouldn't mess with fate.
(12:42):
And I like parts of that, like if it's time
to go, that's the way everyone was in the seventies,
bounced around the back of my parents station wagon, right
they were defined. Yeah they were up for fate. Everyone was.
But now I think I think a little bit differently
at journeying, Like I think a lot about our journeying together. Um.
(13:05):
I have a friend who said to me, these this
amazing thing because the visual is beautiful. You're in your
race car and my wife's in her race car, you know,
so like everybody's in their race car and we're racing
on this track together and sometimes you're racing next to
each other, but sometimes you racing apart from each other.
And I like it. Now I have this visual of
myself in my race car and Michael in his race car.
(13:30):
Yeah we're on the same track. At least you're on
the same track, which I love. But I think the
the difficulty with journeying is that you have to you
have to be willing to let go of yourself of
this belief system. We have this like whether and people
think it's religion. It's not. It's it's a it's a deeper,
deeper belief system. I've spent so much time in India
(13:52):
and in meditation doing vi pasana, which is like a
ten day silent retreat, and that's the thing that always
comes up, the last thing day ten that you're able
to let go of. It's like, why do I have
this strange belief system that no longer serves me? When
we come back, I want to delve into your belief system.
(14:24):
Before the break, we had been speaking with Daniel about
his belief system and letting go of your belief system specifically, however,
you in your podcast have the commandments of traveling, which
is a belief system. Um, it's ironic. Let's be clear,
(14:44):
needed ten, I needed far more. Can we walk through
this before you let go of those beliefs? Can we
just walk through them for the sake of podcast? Well,
they are continuous and will continue I think forever mall.
And they're all phrased by the way everyone as commandments
thou shalt worship all things local that thou shalt know
(15:09):
your starting point, you know. I mean, well, let's take
them one by one so he can. Let's pick a
couple and he can break them down for us. Well,
the one one that I loved just the sound of
it was thou shalt put yourself in the way of magic.
What is that about? Well, firstly, the commandments come in
the positive, whereas I think in the Bible, which I
(15:30):
never shalt not do a lot of things, it's like,
thou shalt not right. And I wanted to make it
a positive thing, like anyone could do this, and I
wanted them to be universal. For instance, thou shalt be generous.
I don't know anybody who doesn't want to be generous,
and I don't want and I don't know anybody who
doesn't want to receive generosity. So I felt like I
(15:52):
wanted to make them for anybody and everybody, regardless of income, race,
where live. Putting yourself in the way of magic is.
It's something that I remember. It's very corny. I rant.
I had a big career in management consulting, and I
washed out terribly, wreckage of myself, and I had to
(16:15):
sort of wash up on the shores of Cape Town,
um emaciated, in black. I'm still in black, but I was,
you know, I was a wreck. So it was truly
your you mean it, it was truly devastating for your personally.
I had a terrible accident in Amsterdam. I fell into
(16:35):
the rach and nearly died. Wait what is that? It's
the canals. Were you in a car on a bicycle?
Of course, Amsterdam, I slipped on ice. It was Christmas time,
so you weren't on a bender and just collapsed into
the course. I was at that time. That's exactly when
(16:59):
I got So it's ten years December, funny time. Well
what I mean now, I've stopped saying I'm so by
Now just say I don't drink and I don't make
any job. It's been the way I've chosen this path
once again. But that's at that time, you were drinking
in your management consultant, almost drowned, and then you fell
(17:20):
into a canal and washed up on the beach in
South Africa. That's it, That's what happened. And um, I
watched Eat, Pray, Love, and there's this moment where Julia
Roberts says this thing about I used to have this
hunger for my life and it's gone. And I got
onto a plane and went to India like the next week.
It was kind of that corny and kind of that cheesy,
(17:44):
and I like that. Like I like that even I,
the cynic, the hardcore could be softened by a soppy
Bryan Murphy movie. It's Julia Roberts. So off I went
and she said something in that book. I love that book.
Actually it Pray Love, because it has some beautiful values.
(18:06):
Even though it's not I'm going to win a Pulitzer,
it could win the hearts. And I quite like that.
I'm a literary snob, so like sometimes I come down
and I read that you know these books of them,
which I which is funny man, and I admire her
ability to do that, and I admire that even I,
(18:26):
the snob, could be moved by that, which means it
was just another belief system of me, the snob I
had to let go of. So she says something about
magic will come to if you're willing to receive it,
and I have kind of thought about that, and I
try and live that every day. So that episode is
(18:46):
about that. It's about magic is all around us, and
it doesn't necessarily mean fairies and Harry Potter, it could
mean any kind of magic. In particular, this episode is
about Estonia, and I went on this incredible road trip
road trip around Estonia, and I kept meeting these incredible
people so in touch with nature, it was unbelievable. Everything
(19:10):
they did was like, well, you either with nature or
against nature. Every moment of every day was spent thinking
about that. There was no evil and good. There was
no good or bad. There was no um must and
mustn't they mustn't. There was no yes or no. There
was just with nature against nature. And I started to
(19:32):
uncover these magical people. I went to the Setma district,
which is eastern Estonia, touching Russia, and I met this
community of woman who it's a woman land community and
they have traditional dress and they believe in creatures of
the forest and being in touch in this way. And
(19:55):
I learned all this folklore from them, and then accidentally
went into Russia. I drove into Russia accidentally across the
bone and there was magic mant too like. I got
held by police by like very scary Russian military and
then um somehow found myself at this like Russian spa
(20:17):
like very stwixt spa like that, like a German kind
of spa where you have a metal table for your
massage table and no oil. No like spa music, just
metal table and some like the police were punishing you
the cross border. It was jail. I went to Russian jail.
(20:46):
We shouldn't kid about that. Ryan girls had a tough time.
That was very bad. No, but your metal table. The
only Russian spo I've ever been to, by the way,
I'll tell you really quickly, they had like a horsehair blanket.
I was so itchy. I was like, please, please be
over and someone was having a should we say not
a massage. It wasn't even a room. It was like
(21:06):
like they were dividers between like and I could hear everything.
It was very I would never go that stitchy in
so many ways. Russia. No, it was in the United States,
but it was. It was Russia. Russian. So anyways, put
that in parentheses, which I love to see people. You
don't have to travel to Russia. You can keep your
(21:27):
carbon footprint light as a feather and have that disgusting
experience right here in America in sheeps. I'm not going
to talk about where it was. I don't want to
insult anyone, but there are there was a bad Russia ended.
But I want to hear more about your yes on
the medal table. Where was the magic in this? Well,
the magic was that the masseuses hands were My whole
(21:52):
body just started to change shape from this experience. This
like giant igor Man came in and mishandled me in
ways that I didn't know my body could move in.
And I haven't had a creek or a problem with
my body since. Well, And if you have a problem,
all you have to do is retrace your steps to
get back to Estonia accipent to go into Russia. It's
(22:15):
sort of arrested escorted back into I think Estonia, and
then find the spot and people look out for the
metal table. SPA incredible You jumped over something magic though
that I kind of want to go back to, which
was India, because you you said, and then I went
to India, everything changes and I end up in Estonia
for this magical experience. Clearly there was magic in that
(22:37):
Indian trip as well, because your life's changed miraculously. Well,
I spend time at an Ushram and you know, I
am a white, privileged boy from Africa that that had
a lot of kind of privilege to work out and entitlement.
You know, I'm a white gay, but still I'm a
white man and a lot of entitlement. I think ms
(23:00):
with that hierarchy, and I have seen that in my life.
I watch how I'm with a group of friends for
dinner and the check will only come to the man
or for some reason I don't drink, and they would
come up to me at a table and hold them
I'm not drinking, just seltzer. Would you like to taste
the wine? I'm like, give it to the woman who
(23:21):
owned it. The wine is life right. And I think
India helped a lot with a kind of peeling back
that entitlement and peeling back that that privilege. And and
I my first trip, I was there for six weeks,
eight weeks, and I cleaned yoga mats and scrubbed flaws
(23:41):
and make dinner, made meals for people, and I didn't
eat until every two and fifty people had eaten at
the ashram. And it did things for me. It's hard
to really explain it until you do things like that,
when you really really put yourself second and you really
(24:06):
just do things out of the goodness and out of
the the kind of essence of who we are. That's
who we really are humans I essentially, I mean I
have been flow with this, but today fine, today, I
believe we're good. Essentially, We're good and we want to
return to that state of goodness all the time. And
USh rams and experiences like that, whether it's a meditation
(24:30):
that you can just do at home, never even leaving
the sofa, can teach you that and tap into that,
and there's magic in that. It's magical that we can
transform ourselves just by tapping into some of those values.
When we come back, I want to tap into into
some more of your wisdom. Before the break, we we're
(25:02):
talking about your commandments of travel, and a lot of
them seem to uh and the wisdom that comes with
those commandments, but they seem to be based in how
we interact with other people. And it's it feels like
much of your travel is not just the place, but
(25:25):
the relationships that you develop in in that travel. Is
that is that a big part of that is actually
so accurate. I'm glad that you get that sense. In fact,
it's not about the place at all. It's about the humanity.
My show is about that. It's about human connection. I
happened to be a travel writer who's you know, been
(25:47):
doing this for the New York Times and publications all
over the world and like a hundred and twenty seven
countries now plus And yeah, I use travel as the vehicle,
but you can use anything as the vehicle. Hoo. For this,
it's I like to tap into humanity. I like the
and this is how the show got created. I wanted
to create something that was not the list. It was
(26:10):
not that you must do best place blah blah blah
blah blah nonsense. It was something about like, it doesn't
matter where you go, it doesn't matter what you do,
it matters who you are. And here's an opportunity for that.
There's there's an episode that I really loved where you
talk about you're in Mississippi and you visited a civil
rights museum, and I think I got this right. You
(26:32):
were looking at sort of the various artifacts and you
found yourself standing next to an elderly black woman and
you just wound up wordlessly taking her hand, and the
two of you cried together. Yeah, so I I mean
that sounds like that. I mean, I'll cry again. What
a profound experience. And I guess I'm wondering but also
(26:55):
extremely rare, but not rare for you. So what is
it that you put out in the world that lets
somebody know not to be afraid if you take their hand,
that makes them feel comfortable crying with you, that bridges,
that breaks down walls, and what do you think it is? Well,
I've been an open person, I think my whole life.
(27:16):
At some point when I was a teenager, I closed
up fully and I kind of battled out my my
battle battleness, and I came out of that in um
and I think a way that that not only opens
me up, but opens other people up. And that's the
that's the trick. It's not about you, it's about everybody else.
(27:37):
My openness is only to open up everybody else. It's
not it's not a selfish thing. I watch how my
husband will be in a room and he'll be like, ah,
someone's going to speak to me, and he like leans
into the wall or like the bar. So there are
habits of openness that and I lean out. I lean
(27:58):
into people and I'm like, I'll tell them something revealing
about myself and people feel emboldened to reveal something about
them all. I stopped by telling people something funny, like
a ridiculous story. The kind of storytellers I'll tell them,
like a hysterical something that just happened. It's always like
(28:18):
off the coffin, just happened, and people will stop laughing,
and then they'll be like, well, you know what happened
to me? My wife? And then dot dot dot and
they tell me the most insane stories, which I love.
But isn't it interesting how how modern travel seems to
be all about enclosing yourself. Luxury is you get to
sit in the front of the plane in a pod
(28:40):
where no one can talk to you. And if you
happen to be traveling with your someone you love, oh
well you're not going to talk to them because there's
like a thick wall of plastic between the two of you.
It's just it seems to me that your style is
completely antithetical to what the travel industry sort of in
(29:01):
some ways pointing us to it. I agree. Therefore, you
have to work harder, that's the point. So as much
as the travel industry or the travel business let's call it,
that is moving us towards more privacy and and um
kind of privatizing our lives. That means you have to
work harder in every other element of your life. And
(29:21):
that's how I take this. So, yes, sometimes I'm up
in the front of the plane and I cannot interact,
but I get up, I go speak to the flight attendant.
I always do that. They all know me American Airlines,
they all know me by now. Um, this morning, this
gentleman who I adore, he's always on the on the
flight to San Francisco. That's he's around. How are your kids,
(29:41):
Moranana wens that when oh, graduating, God, I can't believe
in And we have this funny interaction. Guess what happens
another passenger hears us tell me more and suddenly were
like all chatting quietly, being lovely and kind. But there's
a and look, the flight attendant let you stand up
and get out of your seat for a five minutes.
(30:02):
It's true. So when you go to anywhere, do you
just strike up a conversation with random strangers all the time?
And sometimes you have to have some missus in order
to get some hits right. Sometimes they're real misses, people
that have no idea. But you know, I find that
awkwardness also kind of magical and wonderful. Like some people
(30:23):
cannot tell a story, but I just listen and I
like almost helped them along to tell their story. And
I think they like that. They're like, God, someone's finally
listening to me tell the story. Do you tell them?
I'm a writer and I'm writing about we're in Bangladesh,
And sometimes I totally lie. Sometimes I'm like, you know,
(30:43):
like like ridiculous something and people are like, wow, you
work for the government as an national happy maker whatever.
Like I just make people like double four, Yes, that's okay.
I would be is going to be a game? Could
(31:09):
be you? So like they're covering all the ba What
is the Broccoli family? What's what's the name of If
you're listening right now, we have found your next secret agent.
Movies all over the world have believed, I mean training
it is like Dappa as as. I'm just not. I
(31:31):
just feel like he's small. I have like a I'm
like an alternative guy, like I don't have that tucks.
I can do well. I can do it. Also, you
are quite anti technology, so you would make a bit
of a he'd be a terrible bit of a bad Yes,
even Sean Connery had technology you don't need. Well, you
(31:52):
would probably go for a crazy fast car, but you
do not go for social media. You do not go
for selfies or Instagram or you know. I should be
honest about that. I try not to, but the world
is in a place that it's almost impossible to avoid it.
So I I feel like I like to hop onto
my moral high horse, beautiful, gorgeous, white, um tall horse.
(32:14):
But sometimes I need to be pushed off my horse.
It is true, because it's impossible not to be on
any of these things. It's impossible not to to realize
that it's part of what we live today century, you know,
can you believe that we're going it's the second decade
of the century. And there's something about like if the
(32:36):
president is tweeting and the world is changing by instagram,
you know, political movements are happening. We can't ignore that.
I mean, I'd love to ignore Trump, but but I
I think that it's part of the zeitgeist and we
have to embody that. But we have to embody yet
(32:58):
reject right. So take what you need and move along.
But you're also a travel writer. So people want visual creatures.
We want They want to see what you're seeing. And
the only way to do that is free to be
having taken to me taking pictures and have them and
make them available. And the platform for availabilities Instagram, so
(33:20):
they've got they were going to expect you to share
your adventures with them. I in one of the episodes,
I talk about traveling with my mother to Japan and
Mother's rule is one photo A very fun episode. By
the way, my mother is wonderful. You have quite an
unusual relationship with your mother. I do. We have a
fun we have like we just have fun together and
(33:41):
you skype in your kimonos. Now we do. Do you
know my mother she adopted me. My parents adopted me
when they were faulty, and they were told it was
kind of the last moment they were turning forty at
the time. It was the eight is um you couldn't
adopt after that, and she had given up hope and
(34:04):
it was like that last phone call. So my mother
worships me in that way, like she I came when
she thought that she wasn't going to have a baby.
And my mom is such a she's not a mommy mommy.
She's like a totally different intellectual, Like she spas with
me intellectually, and I'm so grateful. But she set me
on this path of travel, like she was always like,
(34:26):
travel will teach you everything. I can teach you nothing. Goodbye. Um.
But you know, I think, um. I think the the
trick with social media and all of that is we
see too much, right, so we we scroll endlessly, and
I think less scrolling, more pausing. So see one thing,
(34:49):
see five things you don't need to see five things.
So radical curation, So radical, radical curation. I believe in that.
I try and radically curate my friend. I try and
radically curate my time because I can't be in creative
space if it's too much coming at me. I can't.
I don't think that you. I don't think that you
(35:11):
really ponder and take in things if if you don't
spend time looking at fewer things. I'm not saying don't
read you know, books, I'm like, books are plenty, but
be more selective and be and kind of seed life
as your own curation, not what the social media god
(35:35):
small g are giving us, or what the media industry
is pushing down on us. Curate that for yourself, choose it.
So it's like an active choice opposed to UM a
kind of dictation of your life. That's how I see it. Yeah,
well it's great advice and I feel like I'm going
to hit the road with different eyes. I think that
(35:57):
you've definitely given us a new perspective on traveling and
staying at home. So thank you so much. Pleasure is mine,
so so fun to be with you, to be with
you everyone out there. Thanks so much. Subscribe to the
Everywhere podcast with Daniel Shuffler and don't miss um an
(36:18):
episode of Road to Somewhere. The Road to Somewhere is
recorded in New York City. Make sure to share, subscribe, rate,
and review us. We would love to hear from you.
Where are you on your journey? Connect with us on Facebook, Instagram,
and Twitter at pod to Somewhere and email us at
(36:38):
Road to Somewhere at i Heart media dot com. Special
thanks to Alicia Haywood, are incredible producer. Thanks everyone for
joining us on the Road to Somewhere. We're available on
the I Heart Radio app, on Apple podcast or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Road to Somewhere News
Hosts And Creators
Lisa Oz
Jill Herzig
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.