{"id":777,"date":"2026-06-17T11:47:28","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T11:47:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/17\/travel-anxiety-five-tips-from-major-thinkers-to-calm-your-nerves\/"},"modified":"2026-06-17T11:47:28","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T11:47:28","slug":"travel-anxiety-five-tips-from-major-thinkers-to-calm-your-nerves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/17\/travel-anxiety-five-tips-from-major-thinkers-to-calm-your-nerves\/","title":{"rendered":"Travel anxiety: five tips from major thinkers to calm your nerves"},"content":{"rendered":"
The Departure: Second Class by Abraham Solomon (1855).
\n<\/span> National Railway Museum<\/a>, CC BY-NC<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As an academic and journalist who has travelled extensively over the last 20 years \u2013 but also a diagnosed sufferer of generalised anxiety disorder \u2013 I\u2019ve been researching the myriad triggers of travel anxiety.<\/p>\n

Many readers will be familiar with the dread and panic<\/a> that can stem from delayed transport, overcrowded streets, chaotic airports and encounters with officious bureaucrats. But there are also less obvious causes linked to ecological degradation, cultural miscommunication and the complexities of personal identity and experience.<\/p>\n

Research for my new book, The Years of Travelling Anxiously<\/a>, has led me to several writers, philosophers and psychologists whose insights offer remedies to travel anxiety. Here are four examples of common travel anxiety triggers, and tips from major thinkers for overcoming them. <\/p>\n

1. Prioritise your urban wellbeing<\/h2>\n

In his book Places of the Heart<\/a> (2015), psychologist Colin Ellard explains that those who travel in contemporary cities can be made anxious by a lack of \u201cneighbourhood cohesion\u201d, \u201cexposure to toxins or pathogens\u201d, dense traffic and poor urban planning. <\/p>\n

In addition, the French cultural theorist Paul Virilio<\/a> asserts that the modern metropolis\u2019 turbo pace, information overload and vulnerability to technological and environmental disaster can result in psychological dislocation.<\/p>\n

Ellard\u2019s experiments have shown that people who traverse urban spaces experience spikes in adrenaline, blood pressure and heart rate. For our mental and physical health, Ellard claims, when arriving in a new place, we should seek out green spaces, smooth-edged architecture, good sight-lines along streets and natural light.<\/p>\n

\n \"The
\n Ellard recommends seeking out smooth-edged architecture. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York is a good example.<\/span>
\n f11photo\/Shutterstock<\/a><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

2. Educate yourself against communication breakdowns<\/h2>\n

Many travellers feel the pressures of what the sociologist Debbie Lisle<\/a> calls \u201ccross-cultural communication\u201d. In my new book<\/a>, I relate jittery encounters with people with identities, experiences, values and habits different to mine. Outsiders to a culture or society may make unintentional social faux pas and say things that could be construed as patronising or entitled.<\/p>\n

Knowledge and awareness can mitigate these problems. By getting familiar with accounts such as Orientalism<\/a> \u2013 literary critic Edward Said\u2019s critique of the west\u2019s disdainful and over-simplified portrayal of the non-western world \u2013 privileged westerners can start to \u201cacknowledge, address and engage\u201d with their \u201cethical and political responsibility to the other\u201d, as Lisle puts it. <\/p>\n

3. Accept anxiety as a fact of existence<\/h2>\n

The Danish philosopher S\u00f8ren Kierkegaard<\/a> argued that anxiety is a necessary condition for our freedom: \u201cWhoever has learned to be anxious in the right way has learned det H\u00f8ieste<\/em> (the ultimate truths of existence).\u201d <\/p>\n

\n \"Portrait<\/a>
\n Portrait of S\u00f8ren Kierkegaard from 1840.<\/span>
\n The Royal Library of Denmark<\/a><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If travel \u2013 which is often seen as an exercise of freedom<\/a> \u2013 is too easy for us, with no obstacles or snags to contend with, then we won\u2019t learn or gain meaning from it. <\/p>\n

For the same reason, stories across human cultures devote much more time and space to the challenges a hero must overcome rather than the end of the narrative when the hero has overcome such challenges.<\/p>\n

As Tom Waits<\/a> sang, \u201cThe obsession\u2019s in the chasing and not the apprehending \/ The pursuit you see and never the arrest.\u201d<\/p>\n

4. Address your eco-anxiety<\/h2>\n

Flying contributes to 2.5-3%<\/a> of global carbon emissions yet only 4-5%<\/a> of the world\u2019s population travel by plane nearly every year. Most travellers, then, belong to this small elite, which is also complicit in the destructive over-development of tourist areas, particularly in low- and middle-income countries <\/p>\n

As the economist Alessandro Capocchi and colleagues have argued, such overtourism<\/a> brings ever more waste, pollution, soil erosion and destruction of natural habitats.<\/p>\n

The eco-anxiety that can stem from these conditions can, in the eyes of radical ecologist Andreas Malm<\/a> and philosopher Bruno Latour, be usefully mitigated by climate activism and an awareness that humanity and nature are mutually dependent.<\/p>\n

As Latour<\/a> puts it: \u201cAll the resources of science, humanities and the arts will have to be mobilised once again to shift attention to our shared terrestrial condition.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the travel context, these imperatives might compel us to visit sustainable tourist sites and minimise our carbon footprint, thereby reducing feelings of guilt and hypocrisy.<\/p>\n

\n \"A
\n Eco anxiety might compel you to visit sustainable tourist sites.<\/span>
\n Anna Mente\/Shutterstock<\/a><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

5. Remember ignorance is not bliss<\/h2>\n

Playwright Alan Bennett<\/a> contends that we feel reassured when we read a work of literature that articulates \u201ca thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things which you had thought special and particular to you\u201d. If this is true, then an awareness of the great minds who have grappled with the problem of anxiety might just help us to be a little less anxious the next time we travel. <\/p>\n

Before you set off, here\u2019s my recommended travel anxiety reading list: S\u00f8ren Kierkegaard\u2019s The Concept of Anxiety<\/a> (1844), Paul Virilio\u2019s Overexposed City<\/a> (1984), Alain de Botton\u2019s The Art of Travel<\/a> (2002), Debbie Lisle\u2019s The Global Politics of Contemporary Travel Writing<\/a> (2009) and Bruno Latour\u2019s How to Inhabit the Earth<\/a> (2022).<\/p>\n

This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something, The Conversation UK may earn a commission.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Tom Sykes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Departure: Second Class by Abraham Solomon (1855). National Railway Museum, CC BY-NC As an academic and journalist who has travelled extensively over the last 20 years \u2013 but also a diagnosed sufferer of generalised anxiety disorder \u2013 I\u2019ve been researching the myriad triggers of travel anxiety. Many readers will be familiar with the dread […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=777"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}