The journey is my dream, and the destination is unimaginable.

The first time my feet touched foreign soil, I was in the third world. The children would run around in their rugged clothes along dirt streets, kicking ripped-up soccer balls on concrete pads cracked and overgrown with weeds. I was 11 years old and it was all so real.

This was the beginning of my obsession with adventure and travel. Camping, backpacking, repelling, biking, running, flying, anything I could do to get outside my bubble became my passion. This is my life with wanderlust.

You fall in love with the idea of leaving, the adrenaline of the unknown, the confusion of the moment, the clarity of it all is that you need none. Pictures of waterfalls, mountains, valleys, cars, trees, streets, waves, and islands call to you. Distractions from all sides, begging you to leave the desk for the brisk air and danger of adventure. Wanderlust finds you and it holds onto you, maybe because we were really meant for something more than financial stability at the cost of the dreams we could have had. Maybe because our hearts are full of discontentment.

You see people in a new way; the light in their eye is a cry for fresher air, truer love, and greater challenges. The roar of a concert or a jet engine reminds you of the deafening noise of boredom and meaningless entertainment, playing games and laughing at jokes for the sake of the action rather than the joy of the moment.

The rush of waves, the sound of steps, the setting of the sun, the snapping of a twig, the rumble of a crowded city...wanderlust is more than wishing you were somewhere prettier, nicer, or richer. It's more than wishing you lived a life that could get a few thousand likes, pins, or retweets. Wanderlust is being in touch with the exact part of mankind that drove us to explore new frontiers throughout history and explore space.

Wanderlust is knowing that happiness is fleeting: to simply dream about the journey of life is to not live it all.