The last trip to Bieszczady mountains gave me not only great opportunity to connect with my 16 year old brother but also learnings that will help me and my team to grow our Internet marketing businesses.
It is amazing how much work you can get done when you are resting. If you feel burnt out but would like to build an automated machine that will work for you while you are traveling, then I strongly encourage you to close your laptop, move away from your desk, get inspired and change your perspective by changing environment.
In order to move forward, you need new triggers, but how can you get them? Interestingly enough new people you meet, new situations you are in can, new experiences you collect serve as great learnings and provide answers to challenges you are working on working on. How come? because if you are attentive enough, they can serve as powerful metaphors.
So train your mind to see everything around you as metaphors and your life will never be the same again.
The plan was to take my 16 year old brother to a place where I had visited around 15 years ago – Bieszczady mountain.
Here are my top 20 learnings and breakthroughs from the trip.
1. Turn on the Challenge Solver while in Moscow
My flight from Male, Maldives to Warsaw, Poland was a long one. I had a very lengthy transit in Moscow. I read a book, I wrote a book and I still had some time to have red borscht and Russian caviar.
After having read for the fifth time “Wink”, I wanted to type the notes on my laptop but I quickly realised that my three pin British plug will not fit into the European sockets. Fortunately I did not need to wait too long to find the adapter in one of the duty free shops, but when I tried to pay for the adapter I encountered another challenge – the transaction got rejected, my bank blocked the Moscow transaction most likely suspecting a fraud. My phone had the the last few percentages of the battery left. But luckily I managed to call the bank got the card unlocked got my adapter in the last moments of the battery. As a reward I took advantage of the local cuisine and Russian flavors.
2. Go Facebook free, reception free, Internet free
After over 20 hours of traveling I arrived in Poland. Since the summer holiday was about to end so I stayed at home just for couple of days, packed my bags and took off with my 16 year old brother to the remote part of Poland called Bieszczady. This place is frequently referred to as the world’s end. It is a place either for people who had enough of the big cities, the concrete jungles and playing by rules made up by the the societies or people who run away, in the past Bieszczady developed the reputation to be famous hiding place for criminals and people who wanted to escape responsibilities.
Being in a place with no Internet connection was liberating. We quickly realised how dependent we all are on something that did not exist 2 decades ago. There is something special and unique about interpreting the habits of watching screens, brushing glass surfaces with fingers and forgetting to blink. Instead we needed to lift up our eyes and start seeing the wild beauty around us.
I prescribe it for every Internet marketer to do it at least once a month. As paradoxical as it sounds but it is good for your Internet business. You will be surprised to see that suddenly different streams of thoughts start flowing in.
3. Have a clear outcome but be flexible
I knew I wanted to do biking and hiking. I love to plan my trips but I love to keep an eye and see things and follow the flow as we never know where the flow can take us. Same is in the business.
4. Talk to people
On the way we met some incredible people, the conversations led us to many shortcuts, incredible facts, stories, local knowledge and places we would not have discovered otherwise.
5. Make loads of friends
I love getting curious about people, there is something special about getting to know other fellow travelers and discovering their gifts, talents and accumulated knowledge. I made it a habit to keep in touch and add people to my social database – Facebook. You never know where and how you will meet again. I have some incredible friendships that developed after being sparked by a random chat and staying in touch.
6. Hire Bikes and Challenge yourself physically
After arriving in Wetlina we gave a call to mobile bike company that delivers and collects bikes wherever you are. Great business idea with special unique selling point that clearly adds value.
We mounted our bikes and we chose a path through valleys, hills and mountains. The route was amazing, the views were stunning, the air was fresh. Traveling on bikes gave us a totally different experience than we would get by just walking. We left around 1 pm and got home around 8 pm, we did around 40 km. The hills and mountains on the way got me realised that I need to visit gym more often. The last kilometers were challenging and exhausting for the body but refreshing for the mind.
7. Pump up Your Adrenaline
I have to say climbing up the hills was challenging but riding the bikes down the hill was thrilling. The speed, the flying gravel and the changing landscape was loads of fun.
8. Turn Challenge into new adventure – Trout
When we finished the biking route, around Cisne we got on the main road. From there we had around 7 km to get back to Wetlina to our shelter. On the way back we got caught by rain so we decided to stop by to catch a fish, grill it and turn into lunch.
9. Look for alternatives – landing net
At the fishing farm, they gave us two fishing rods. The first one was a spinning one and second one had a float, we used corn for bait. There were three ponds next to each other with plenty of fish near the surface so it looked like an easy catch. However, it turned out to be very different. We were getting more and more hungry but the fish must have had lunch before we arrived, none of them was interested. Then we looked for an alternative, instead of fishing with a fishing rod I took a landing net and tried my luck looking to grab one of the lazy fish cruising near the surface, it worked. We had our lunch.
10. Be Prepared to Change Your Expectations – Trade View for Fog
On the second day we went hiking. The plan was to climb “Chatka Puchatka Schronisko”, that means “Winnie the Pooh Shelter”. I had visited the place around 15 years ago and I expected to see the amazing view from the top of the hill but it turned out we got fog and gentle shower instead. It was clearly a different experience and we loved it.
11. Utilise the beauty and record videos
When we got lower down the hill, we saw hills, mountains and green pastures. The view was stunning. We took advantage of the opportunity to record videos for you.
12. Stop by and eat sheep cheese
Near the road we found a small cottage selling goat and sheep cheese. Quite salty but very good. Another unplanned and random stop bringing new flavors.
13. Travel to see the sunset
On the third day we came to see the famous dam by the Solina lake. We took a local bus, came just in time to take advantage of the setting sun.
14. Change Your Plans
We planned to spend the last night at Solina, however when we arrived there, seen the area, seen the sunset, had some food then we got a feeling that it was more like a regular commercial resort and that did not fit the feel of our holiday and so we changed our plans. We spoke to the locals and we decided to travel to a place called Uherce Mineralne to try trolley.
Local group of entrepreneurs turned unused railtrack, and a train station and converted it into a really cool experience.
15. Wake up early to look for beavers
We arrived at Uherce Mineralne way past after the sunset, we stayed at a local inn. Our landlady had a horse farm, they owned a very small bread typical for the region. At the breakfast table she told us about the beavers living in the nearby stream and a small zoo run by a Christian charity. Normally I wake up early morning for my hour of power. On that day I traded it for a trip to search for beavers and check the local zoo. New stimulus.
16. Choose adventure over comfort
The Trolley Trip was fun and a good exercise, it lasted for around 2h. After finishing it was time to move, we walked towards a bus stop in Uherce Mineralne. I asked Seba to check what time was the next bus. We were virtually in the middle of nowhere so we were hoping to get a bus to the nearby Sanok or if we were lucky to a bigger city Rzeszow. However, to our surprise there was only one bus leaving each day from this bus stop. What is even more surprising is the bus was directly to Warsaw and it was in 2 minutes. We looked at each other, we turned our heads and we saw a bus just arriving at our bus stop. The driver opened the door, looked at us, we looked at each other and then I asked Seba smiling “Bus or Hitchhiking?”, he looked at me smiling and said “Hitchhiking”. We told the driver thank you and we watched the bus leaving us behind. Fully trusting that we will be able to get to Warsaw hitchhiking in one day, that is around 400 km.
17. Make it a Game Fun to Play – Hitchhiking
To make It fun, we decided to play a game, we decided to compete who would be better at stopping passing by cars. The activity was not only an opportunity to reconnect with what I frequently did in my teens but it was also an opportunity to explain the sales process to Seba. There were so many lessons that were built in the process including:
- Engaging with potential customers,
- Finding a way to be different
- Presentation skills
- State management
- Disciplining the disappointment,
- Having fun etc”.
18. Trust Your Guts
Around 8 hours later we were in Radom, around 80 km away from home. It was so close but still so far because it was already past 10 pm. There were no more buses, we missed the last train and we had to decide if we were going to get a hotel to stay overnight or should we try to hitchhike the last leg before the midnight. We chose hitchhiking. We needed to walk around 5km in order to get to the junction that included road leading to Warsaw. We stopped at the petrol station, ate some quick unhealthy food and walked towards the junction. We got there around 11 pm.
To our surprise pretty much immediately when we got to the bus stop we manage to stop a private bus. Behind the windshield it had a plate written in Cyrillic language – Warsaw. We got inside excited, Ukrainian driver looked at least confused or lost, he invited us to get inside “dawai”, he asked for help to get him to a specific location, I told him that if he could give us a lift to a nearby town called Piaseczno he agreed saying “harasho”. When we took our seats I felt both exited but somehow I felt tension and felt very uneasy, it just did not feel right. I noticed around very anxious faces. I tapped Seba on the shoulder and we pretended we needed to do something and we left the bus with some lame excuse. For some reason that is hard to explain I felt extremely uneasy indie the bus. So we got back to square one. About 30 min later we got our final transport to Warsaw and reached home around 3 am, exhausted but safe.
19. Create and Collect memories
I think it was Tony Robbins who said, “Life worth living is worth recording”. In our daily adventures, we meet incredible people, experience unusual situations but if not recorded the precious moments would go away and evaporate like a mist within few days or months.
I made it a point to record many of the precious moments either in blog posts like this or in my private journal. It all serves as an incredible source of stories to share. I remember once listening to a motivational guy who challenged his listeners to get a leather bound notebook and start recording. It changed my life, so now I challenge you to do the same. Do it today.
20. Earn while you travel
What is really cool you can travel the world, taste the incredible flavours, meet amazing people, have loads of fun then talk about it and earn. If you like the idea, click the link below, put your email address and watch the training that I have prepared for you. Take it seriously and it will change your life.
