Why do I feel more like myself away from home?
Traveling often brings a sense of lightness. You might find yourself talking to strangers or making decisions with a speed that feels foreign. Yet, after returning home for a few days, the familiar version of you returns.
The anonymity of the road
William Hazlitt preferred traveling alone. In his essay “On Going a Journey,” he noted that being unknown to those he met allowed him a specific kind of freedom:
In his ignorance of me and my affairs, I in a manner forget myself.
— William Hazlitt, "On Going a Journey," Table Talk, Essay III
Friends do not offer this. They remember “the less sublime portions of your history.” When a friend mentions an old story, that version of you enters the room again.
Hazlitt did not claim to find his true self while traveling. He says the opposite: it is great “to lose our importunate, tormenting, everlasting personal identity.” Identity is the version others carry.
Escaping identity
This identity is the image other people maintain of you: your job, your reputation, and your old conflicts. At an inn, Hazlitt wrote, “We are no more those hackneyed common-places that we appear in the world.”
You do not have to perform.
The feeling of being “more yourself” abroad is often just the absence of the person you are expected to be at home. In your own city, people treat you as someone you may have already outgrown. You continue to play that part.
The role vs. the location
A new location does not always bring change, as explored in I moved to a new city but nothing changed. Roles can be stronger than places.
The nature of these roles is discussed in who am I underneath all my roles, while did I become what people expected me to be examines how these expectations are formed.
For a short time, a traveler has no history. This pause allows you to notice which parts of your established identity you no longer wish to carry.
How am I known at home, and what part of it do I no longer want to carry?
Epimelea is an app built around the existential school. The conversation carries over from one meeting to the next. The archive is encrypted on the device and belongs to the person who wrote it.
About the app: an AI therapist for long-term therapy
This page is about a school of psychotherapy. It is not medical advice and not emergency help. If you are in danger right now, contact your local emergency number, or find a helpline in your country at findahelpline.com.