Whoever Says “Paradise” is Just a State of Mind, Does Not Travel

“Paradise” is more than just an idea, a heavenly afterlife or a hypothetical utopia… it’s a real place and the world is scattered with them.

“Why have we had to invent Eden, to live submerged in the nostalgia of a lost paradise, to make up utopias, propose a future for ourselves?” -Julio Cortazar

More valuable than high intelligence, we are gifted with boundless imagination. Among the equally endless possibilities of it, it lets us “get away” or find another place but never physically leaving a place.

A place we consider our own mental paradise relative to our current situation or location, like daydreaming.

It’s a nice tool to help us through life but this dream can be a reality and paradise an actual place.

If you know me, you know I tend to get philosophical and even sentimental, but sometimes the tangible trumps all that jazz – that’s why we have multiple senses.

It’s been said that; “Whoever says money can’t buy you happiness, does not have any.” Well I say; “Whoever says “paradise” is just a state of mind, does not travel.”

This is not about the desire for possessions. Money can indeed buy varied levels of actual happiness in the same way travel can take you to actual paradises.

In fact, vagabonding is a cure for materialism.

These “paradises” are not rare or exclusive to the select few, they are often inexpensive and open to anyone, but that doesn’t make them any less special.

Anyone willing to travel, that is.

Maybe it’s a beach on a tropical island where time doesn’t exist or a waterfall in a lush jungle where fairies roam. It doesn’t matter what it is, just that it’s a scalable place somewhere in the physical world.

You can invent a paradise in your head and let it come to you or you can pick yourself up and journey to a real one.

Whoever says “paradise” is just a state of mind, does not travel.