Creativity flourishes under the ideal psychological conditions that result from a self engaged in expanding ever more enriching modes of experience. New forms of experience present new meanings, some offering new values. Values that promote greater harmony between the individual and the environment provide avenues for growth, which fortify the self and foster the unfolding of further potential. This is valuable not only to the growing individual but also to society” (Uffelman, 2011p. 329)

Dewey extols experience as the place of learning—a pedagogy of infinite possibility.  My Cagli experience jump-started early in the morning on the first day of class. I took a hike with a friend on a ridge a mile outside the city walls. He knew the ridge and scaled it goat-like; he did not know about my acrophobia. After 50 feet, he asked if I had problem with heights but by then retreating was a paralyzing option. In the 45 minute 35ish degree assent I was clinging to roots and rocks and mostly crawling, nauseous, dizzy and unconcerned about bleeding, torn clothes, and bruised legs…my guide oblivious to the internal agony, continually urging me upward, cautioning me not to look back or down and deaf to my cursing and claims that I could not go on…”forward facing…always forward facing!” Arriving at the top, I stood with my hands raised in victory…fortified and bursting with metaphor.

travel as a political act

Swiss Alps, 2011

Rick Steves’ discussion of American Empire would have run me off …from Rick Steves and Gonzaga a decade ago. For many years I held fast to a socio-political-spiritual philosophy that quickly tucked those trigger words into a tightly sealed box labeled blind liberals—accompanied by a “feisty response” (Steves, 2009. p. 96) summarily  dismissing the ideas and the people offering them. Steves proposes that a large part of the world holds this perception and will treat us accordingly; this is valuable information for overseas travelers.  I remember after 911 I was jolted to think anyone had a reason to hate America.

Steves describes sources of this perception including the US dismissal of the UN, gregarious “hard power”(Steves, 2009, p. 97) militarism, and the war on terrorism that has multiplied our enemies.  All of these were sanctioned as quasi Holy Writ in my world and were akin to heresy if questioned; whole groups of people were summarily dismissed who held other views.  Many changes have occurred in me over the past few years as I find it more comfortable to let go of a hard line seeking instead to hold conflicting ideas in tension; Steves’ ideas are palatable to me and applicable to my overseas trekking. One element that was missing in my perceptual framework of many years was a simple compassion for others. My rigid doctrine blinded me to this absence.

Steves’ experiences in Iran persuade me that I can effectively diffuse misunderstanding in small ways as I engage the people in my travels in Italy and beyond. He talks about the shock of Iranians when they discover he is American stating, “They seem to be thinking, ‘I thought Americans hate us’"(p. 168). It is particularly easy to make assumptions and hold hatred of people we cannot see and especially those in a part of the world we know nothing about; the distance facilitates this. By traversing the physical gap through travel, we come face to face and find there are no foreigners. "Compassion is the quivering of the pure heart...when we have allowed ourselves to be touched by the pain of life...under this rubric, even the idea of enemy vanishes" (Brussat, 1996, p. 91).

Brussat, F. (1996). Spiritual literacy: Reading the sacred in everyday life. New York, NY: Scribner.

Steves, R. (2009). Travel as a political act. New York, NY: Nation Books.