In October of 2022 I was invited by my friends of REMOTE LATIN AMERICA (www.remote.la) to the beautiful town of Cafayate in Salta, Argentina.
They asked me to talk about the bond between travel and personal change, and how to bring the most out of our travels.
This is what they wrote about it:
“A travel is a journey through unfamiliar territories,” says Argentine psychologist and travel therapist, Javier Labourt, the REMOTE Talks speaker on our very last day of REMOTE Immersion Cafayate. After years of studying the relationship between psychology and travel, two of his passions, Javier came to the conclusion that travel has the “powerful capacity of changing our perspective, affecting our fears and empowering ourselves.”
At a time when mental health has become a sensitive and important issue, Labourt stresses how travel can be important for personal change, transforming our relationship with fear and creating human connections.
According to the specialist, there are four therapeutic travel goals that one can seek: building self-knowledge, self-esteem, cognitive flexibility (capacity of adaptation) and empathy. “When traveling, we’re on fertile ground to plant the seed of personal change. Travel is the perfect scenario in which to build and facilitate human empathy,” says Labourt. “I wanted you to realize that what you do [as travel professionals] is helping people boost their mental health.”
Javier Labourt defines himself as a “creative psychologist that’s passionate about understanding the relationship between travel and personal change.” He is a licensed psychologist in Buenos Aires, Argentina and has a Master’s Degree in Psychology from Palo Alto University in California, USA.