How RP Encouraged Me to Break Out of My Comfort Zone and Create Lifelong Friends

My main piece of advice for Rustic Pathways trips is to choose a trip that will push you out of your comfort zone. It may seem scary, daunting, and, frankly, like you won’t enjoy your time, but I guarantee you, no matter what, you will have the most amazing time on a Rustic Pathways trip. Throughout my high school years, I have been on two different trips with Rustic. First, in the summer of 2018, I went to Thailand on Elephants and Amazing Thailand, and secondly, I went on Moroccan Wanderer in Morocco in the summer of 2019. Both trips were amazing. I started my journey to the airport before my first trip in 2018 worrying about making friends. I have never been an extrovert, and, although I do have many friends, I have never been one to eagerly associate with others with as much enthusiasm as some of my friends, something that scared me when entering an environment with people I had never met. Yet, that’s the beauty of these trips. Student travelers are all likeminded kids. We are all seeking out new experiences and want to learn about the world. Although I have met many types of people throughout each and every trip, coming from different political views, backgrounds, and cultures, many of which, having very different personalities than my own, Rustic has a way of bringing people together. To this very day, I consider many of my fellow travelers to be my best friends, talking to many of them every day. That is just one reason why I have continued going on trips with Rustic Pathways, as not only were the staff members some of the most amazing and understanding people I have met, with so much experience to share about life and careers, and not only for the fact that the trips as a whole were an amazing experience fit with athletic activities, new foods, and new languages and cultures, but that it has helped me break out of my comfort zone and create new friends that I now consider family.