I was always told to “travel while you’re young” — and I truly hate this advice.
“Travel solo so you can see the world.”
“Dance in the streets, drink heavily with locals, jump out of planes — do it all while you’re young. Soon enough you’ll be married, then you’ll have children (and a crippling interest rate), and you can look back on those days and tell your grandchildren of the wild times you had… when you were young.”
My name is Meg. I’m a single 37-year-old mum with a four-year-old son. I still travel solo, and I call bull*** on society’s expectation that I shouldn’t spend time alone.
I started traveling solo at 18. And I did all the things they tell you to do while you’re young. I danced in the streets, I jumped out of planes, I drank Italian wine, I flirted with foreign men — flirted so well that an American I met in Tanzania later became my husband. To this day, he remains my most permanent travel souvenir.
And when I travel solo (present tense), I feel alive.
I feel alive because I’m seeing the world in living colour instead of settling for the TV. I’m touching ancient history with my hands instead of getting papercuts from a musty textbook. I’m tasting food in the very place the ingredients are grown, meeting incredible humans whose lives look nothing like mine. That connection — to the world, to others, to myself — is what fills my cup. It’s what gives me energy, drive, and joy.
We all get one life. And besides owing happiness to ourselves, don’t we owe it to everyone around us — our partners, our children, our parents, our friends — to show up as the most grounded, inspired, and fully alive version of ourselves?
Why should I stop traveling solo when that’s the version of myself my husband fell in love with? When that’s the version of myself — the one lit up by curiosity and genuine love for life — that I want my child to know?
Why should I shrink, dim, or mould myself into something smaller because society can’t imagine a woman stepping away for a week without guilt?
Regardless of who you are, alone time is essential for emotional, mental, spiritual, social, and physical wellbeing. We all need time away from our roles at work, as parents, as partners — not because those roles aren’t meaningful, but because being “on” in every direction eventually drains anyone. Time alone is how we breathe again.
But what gets in the way is the pressure. The commentary. The sideways glances dressed up as concern. The belief that a woman’s commitment to her family is measured by her physical proximity at all times.
There was genuine confusion when I announced I was pregnant and then calmly noted that I didn’t intend to stop traveling alone.
A surprising number of people asked, “But how will your husband cope?” As if a man spending a few days solo parenting is an emergency situation. As if women have some secret manual that men are incapable of reading. As if Australia has so little faith in our fathers that the default answer is incompetence.
It revealed something bigger: people don’t know where to place a woman who refuses to outsource her happiness, curiosity, and identity to motherhood.
While we’re often conditioned to believe otherwise, you deserve to know this: regardless of your circumstances, responsibilities, or relationship status, taking time alone is not selfish. Whether you choose to travel for a week or check into a hotel 10 minutes from home (highly recommend for new mums), having space to yourself is healthy. It is responsible. It is part of being human.
If a new father takes a work trip a year after his baby is born, we praise him. Dedication. Provider. Commitment.
But health is wealth too — and mental balance should carry as much weight as financial stability. We cannot preach the importance of mental health while shaming women for doing the very things that protect it.
So am I selfish for continuing to travel solo?
You’re welcome to think so. Truly. Because the real obstacle isn’t my itinerary — it’s the stereotypes we’ve absorbed. The ones people hold of us, and the ones we quietly hold of ourselves. Women learn early that independence is admirable until it interferes with our usefulness. That alone time is suspicious unless it’s labelled “self-care” and sponsored by a skincare brand.
But being alone doesn’t mean being lonely. And traveling solo doesn’t mean being single. It simply means choosing yourself in a world that constantly asks you to be everything to everyone.
If mental health is becoming a national priority, we need to be honest about the stigma around women being alone — in public, in travel, in life. The fear of judgment keeps more women grounded than fear of flying ever has.
Until that changes, I’ll send you a postcard.
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