The Atlas

I just got back from spending the past two weeks exploring the State of Puebla in Mexico. Aside from the beautiful art, amazing food and incredible scenery throughout the state, one of the things that is always most interesting to me is other travelers — particularly the groups of women over-40 traveling together.

This is always one of my favorite spectator sports when I'm on vacation. When I invariably find myself talking to these women, I often hear similar stories:

• When my kids were little, we only did family vacations to places for them. I couldn't start exploring what I wanted until they left for college.
• My husband doesn't like traveling, so I just go with my girlfriends.
• When I first started my own business, I never made time for this. Now it's one of the highlights of my year.
• I could never do this when I had a corporate job. Having this freedom was part of what made me want to start my own business.My mother used to really worry about these trips. Now she tells me she wishes she could have had the option when she was my age.
• I took my mother and her sister on her first girls trip in their 80's. We had a blast!

What I love about these stories is that each of these women hit a point in their lives — often around their mid-40's — where they suddenly came to understand that they wanted something more, bigger, different. Some of them had radical solutions (career change, divorce, etc.), while others found incremental adjustments. But all of them found something they didn't have before: a sense of freedom — from expectations, from obligations, from fear, from the confines of their comfort zone.

I absolutely love that. And talking to these women has become one of my favorite things about my own vacations — regardless of where I go.

In the meantime, I hope you have a fantastic week. And good luck antagonizing the status quo.