The Shout Out.
Everything in life is about building and nurturing relationships. Success in life, in my book, depends greatly on how you can build and maintain both personal and professional connections.
There are so many reasons why I love working in the travel industry. Having worked in the social work arena for so many years where most people really felt discouraged and disheartened by their jobs to entering into the world of travel where everyone is all about hospitality and ensuring their clients feel good and walk away happy, reinforces my decision to have made the career switch to travel.
I travel a lot for work and I love it. Not only do I enjoy seeing places and having new experiences that I can share with my clients, but I simply adore meeting new people within the travel industry and building good working relationships with them. When I walk into a trade show, I'm like a kid in a candy store. My eyes flit about, scanning all of the beautiful displays of hotels, tour operators, and various countries represented. I could talk with people all day and learn about what they do and what they have to offer potential travelers. There's a term in the psychology world called, "flow". Here's the definition:
"In positive psychology, flow, also known as the zone, is the mental state of operation in which a person performing an activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity. Wikipedia"
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| A colleague of mine snapped this picture of me at the Guatemala Trade Show. Clearly, I have a little bit of enthusiasm! |
When I am connecting with people in the travel industry, learning about their cultures, building professional and often times wonderful friendships, I am in the flow. This is my zone. This is what I love to do.
After five years of owning and operating Viva la Vida Travel and traveling around to meet new industry partners, I can honestly say that I have met some of the most inspiring, kind, hard working and dedicated people I've ever met. They have made my job so much easier. A travel agent or as I call myself, a Travel Ambassador, is on the front line of bringing a world of adventures to travelers through our thoughtfully planned and nurtured relationships within the industry.We make the connections to the tour operators, hotels, restaurants and everything in between so that we can provide our clients a wonderful trip with trusted travel partners. We, my travel colleagues and myself, LOVE what we do and we all work really hard to ensure that our clients and guests have an outstanding time on their journey.
So, all of that being said, I'd like to say a great big THANK YOU to everyone that I have met along the way in my travels. Whether I've met you at a trade show and have worked with you to design beautiful and inspiring travels for our clients, learned about you via a webinar and connected personally or if I've met you on a travel agent FAM trip, I've been inspired by you and your work. Thank you for providing quality travel opportunities to our clients. Thank you for being easy to work with and always positive. Thank you for laughing with me and answering all of my unending questions. Your efforts go noticed and your diligence to provide travel experiences that inspire and excite people is infectious. I can't say it enough . . .
Thank you!
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