We like to think of travel as movement, a journey from one place to another. But do we ever actually “go” anywhere? No matter how far we venture—whether across the globe or just across town—we always feel like we’re here. The scenery changes, the culture shifts, we may have the thought in our mind that we are far from another here called home, but our internal sense of presence, of here-ness, remains fixed. If you have ever been to the other side of the planet and felt it odd that you didn’t feel it to be more… odd, perhaps it’s because after the jet lag and the culture shock wears off, you are simply here. And in the end, one here feels just like another.
Consider an astronaut floating in space, free from gravity’s pull. On Earth, we rely on proprioception—our body’s ability to sense its relation to its environment. We are anchored by the gravity acting on our muscles and joints and inner ear, which gives us a sense of orientation. But in zero gravity, that reference disappears. Without weight or resistance, an astronaut feels completely still, even as the universe drifts and twists by. Thrust right, thrust left, and it’s not you moving but the scenery moving around you. Movement, then, is not an absolute experience—it’s a trick of perception, dictated by the forces acting on our bodies. But here’s the thing, literally: the same is true for us on Earth. No matter how fast we run, drive, or fly, we never actually leave here—we simply watch new parts of existence reveal themselves to us.
It’s almost as if we live inside a 3D-rendered world. A kind of advanced game simulation where the environment updates dynamically. Other characters populate this world, each living out their own narratives. We interact with them, learn from them, and even reshape our own storylines through them. Yet, no matter how the people and the landscape seems to change, we never escape the fundamental truth: We are always here. However we conceptualize it. At home, far from home, no matter. Always it is here. In a sense, we share a split-screen game interface with 7 billion other players.
If this is true (and it is) then what is “distance” other than a construct? Just as time is a measurement of change, distance is a measurement of proximity, a tool to help us make sense of why my here seems different than yours, and how we can coordinate the two at a certain time.
And if we are always here (which we are), then perhaps everything is here—the entire world, all possibilities, all versions of experience. Where does the space in a game exist? When I move in the game, am I really moving?
John Lennon’s lyric— I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together— might seem like whimsical wordplay, but it gestures toward a deeper truth. The boundaries we perceive between ourselves and others, between here and there, may be more illusion than reality. Black Elk, the Native American spiritual leader, expressed a similar idea from a different perspective: At the center of the universe dwells the Great Spirit, and that center is really everywhere, it is within each of us.
Travel is just the act of unlocking new parts of the game engine, not actually moving across it. The real frontier isn’t out there—it’s in how much of reality we choose to access.
This understanding changes everything. It means the experiences we seek through travel—wonder, connection, transformation—aren’t tied to specific places. They are states of consciousness, always available to us, waiting to be accessed. You don’t need a plane ticket to expand your reality. You just need to realize that it was never limited in the first place.
Discovering Nonduality 