Whether you are an adventurous traveler who climbs mountains and treks through the jungle or you are a lover of comforts living in five-star hotels, traveling will teach you some of life’s great lessons. It doesn’t matter if you were born a beach bum or if you are an art enthusiast, traveling will enrich your life.

Whether you prefer to travel in a group or on your own, whether you are a planner or a spontaneous person, your life will benefit from traveling far from what you know. You don’t have to go far, you may or may not cross oceans, take a plane, train or because the important thing is that you explore the world outside of your community.

What will you discover?

See the familiar through new eyes: Travel to a place you know well with someone who has never been there before. On a trip to Pittsburgh, where I grew up, my niece and her boyfriend showed me a city full of unique and charming old neighborhoods, museums dedicated to things like ketchup, Andy Warhol, and the birth of the labor movement. I also saw that the view of the three rivers from Mount Washington is as beautiful as any view of a big city.

We are small: Stroll through the redwood forests of California or hike through Rocky Mountain National Park and you’ll discover just how small we are.

There are more similarities than differences: Stand on the coast of Nova Scotia, Canada and then on the coast of Brittany in France, you will notice the similarities in the landscape and the people despite the fact that these two places are separated by an ocean.

You can be someone else: People have thought that I was Dutch in Lucca, Italy and Quito Ecuador, French in Venice and German in Rome. In fact, the only place where people absolutely know that I am American is in Canada. It’s fun to play along and see where it takes you.

Food can be part of your adventure: You will discover that beautiful food is not always good and ugly food is not always bad. It is not the wine that is important, the important thing is the new and old friends with whom you share it.

You can be happy if you start on your own: If you travel in a group you do not need to do everything that your companions do. Some people have an amazing knack for art museums, others prefer churches, and still others can walk for miles without a break. After spending a week in France looking at buildings designed by the architect Corbusier, I finally rented a car and went to St. Tropez. Everyone was happy after that.

The rain is also beautiful: The sun does not have to shine to beautify a place; standing in the rain in a tropical forest is just as beautiful as sitting in the sun in Portofino.

Beauty is all around you, just look and you will see: Enjoy the colors of the New Mexico landscape and the lack of contrast between the water, ice, and landscape on a cloudy day in Newfoundland.

New York City is not America, Paris is not France: You learn not to judge a country by a city: New York City is not representative of the United States and Paris is not representative of France.

Old is a state of mind: In some countries age is measured in thousands of years, in other countries it is measured in hundreds of years. In people, old age is a state of mind, if you are young look around you at older travelers who walk the same paths as you only with canes and canes, often with a smile on their faces.

When disaster strikes: Traveling makes you feel empathy when disaster strikes. How many people cried after Hurricane Katrina remembering the people they knew in New Orleans or Biloxi? The tourist trade helped revive the Southeast Asian economy after the tsunami in 2004.

Conceived: Take a break and imagine what everyday life is like in the place you are visiting, and then think about what it was like a hundred or a thousand years ago.

If someone asks you to sing, then sing!: Get out of your comfort zone, try to speak the language, if people are singing join in.

Smiles translate: When in doubt smile, they mean the same in all languages. You will most likely be rewarded with a smile in return.

No amount of reading books, watching TV, or listening to music can replace the experience of getting off the couch and going to see it all for yourself. You will never look at the world the same way again.