Travel, stories, education: The keys to happiness?

Sus­tain­able tour­ism expert and edu­cat­or Ivana Dam­njan­ović is pas­sion­ate about travel, stor­ies, and edu­ca­tion; so much so that she thinks that they could be the source of, frame­work for, and means to hap­pi­ness. It’s a “Good Tour­ism” Insight.

Travel & tour­ism has long been con­sidered a magic box that brings cer­tain profit. No mat­ter how many resources we use up deliv­er­ing tour­ists to des­tin­a­tions, and exper­i­ences to tour­ists, we profit from them. Infinitely.

How­ever, we increas­ingly under­stand that tour­ism is no fairy tale; that per­haps that myth­ic­al magic box may have once belonged to Pan­dora. Yet we can­not deny that travel & tour­ism does cre­ate magic. A dif­fer­ent kind of magic.

Travel & tourism: A source of happiness?

It appears that a route for­ward for tour­ism calls for retra­cing our steps to a point that allows us to nav­ig­ate towards a more favour­able future. To release all the poten­tial of tour­ism to bring about good, we need to re-invent how we define its suc­cess. Perhaps:

• Stop simply meas­ur­ing tourism;
• Use meas­ure­ments to under­stand tour­ism in all its com­plex­ity; and
• Make informed decisions about tour­ism based on the results. 

There are many innov­at­ive and inspir­ing approaches and ini­ti­at­ives that have been sped up by the pan­dem­ic; new ways of think­ing and act­ing that poten­tially facil­it­ate this neces­sary trans­form­a­tion of the world of travel. I am at once proud and humble to act­ively engage in some of them, includ­ing the Glob­al Sus­tain­able Tour­ism Coun­cil, the Future of Tour­ism Coali­tion, and Plan­et Hap­pi­ness, to name a few. As an edu­cat­or and a research­er, I can­not but hon­our the work of many others. 

Also see Paul Rogers’ “GT” Insight
“Why build well-being into des­tin­a­tion resi­li­ence and tour­ism recovery?”

With this new wave swell­ing, there is great­er poten­tial to walk our talk; not silo our approaches, but see them col­lect­ively as an evolving human-nat­ur­al liv­ing sys­tem in which exists a mutu­ally-com­ple­ment­ary role for each approach. In one way or the oth­er, all of these ini­ti­at­ives are heed­ful of the well-being of numer­ous stake­hold­ers in des­tin­a­tions, par­tic­u­larly loc­al com­munit­ies and the nat­ur­al envir­on­ment. There­fore, the sig­ni­fic­ance of today’s well-being agenda is its capa­city to help trans­form the world of travel so that every­body and everything in it is happy. 

I was recently asked to define hap­pi­ness, and I came up with this:

“Hap­pi­ness is a mul­ti­fa­ceted notion, attain­able only if all ele­ments of the com­plex milieu of life are thriv­ing. It depends on a deep under­stand­ing of the inter­con­nec­ted­ness between indi­vidu­al and uni­ver­sal realms of being.”

In the tour­ism con­text, hap­pi­ness essen­tially trans­lates into two sen­ti­ments: grate­ful­ness and being wel­come. Tour­ism, in gen­er­al, should find ways to value the resources it is invited to use. Only then will it be wel­come; when all those even touched by tour­ism feel it as a force for good in terms of the human and nat­ur­al sys­tems upon which it relies. To that aim, tour­ism has to care­fully listen to the needs of all the ele­ments that com­prise what we call a des­tin­a­tion. It also needs to learn what hurts a des­tin­a­tion, such as over­tour­ism, so it can help heal and regen­er­ate it. 

Behind this pro­cess, there lives a story …

Storytelling: A framework for happiness?

Mean­ing­ful, pur­pose­ful, impact­ful travel that ulti­mately leads to trans­form­a­tions in tour­ists’ per­son­al­it­ies, views, beha­viours, and life­styles had been on the rise years before the pan­dem­ic. How­ever, over the past year there has been a great emphas­is on well­being-motiv­ated travel. Although it shines a light on the pos­it­ive nature of tour­ism, it remains clouded by its one-sided­ness. Can we hon­estly call it well-being travel if it is designed only for tour­ists? Well-being is a state shared by all stake­hold­ers in a des­tin­a­tion, or it is not well-being at all.

Well-being relies on the truth hid­den behind des­tin­a­tion stor­ies. They define us. Our per­son­al and col­lect­ive his­tory con­tains stor­ies both lit­er­ally and fun­da­ment­ally. We travel to take up a role in a story. The pit­fall so far has been oblit­er­at­ing the genu­ine des­tin­a­tion story in favour of the hyper­bol­ic indi­vidu­al tour­ists’ stor­ies. That way, a des­tin­a­tion becomes all things to all people but its own. Sub­or­din­ate to tour­ism, wrought with unfoun­ded expect­a­tions, dis­il­lu­sion, and bit­ter dis­ap­point­ments, it spins its slow but cer­tain death spir­al until it becomes both undesir­able to loc­als and undesir­able to vis­it­ors. There­fore, tour­ists should not be allowed to demand their own stor­ies, rather they should be offered a choice of those a des­tin­a­tion is pre­pared to offer.

Tour­ism storytelling is an invit­a­tion and address to vis­it. We do not extend invit­a­tions to those who are not wel­come. Neither do we accept them when they do not res­on­ate with us. This is how we ensure that the right kind of tour­ists become a part of our des­tin­a­tion story; tour­ists with whom our des­tin­a­tion evolves into an enriched ver­sion of itself. Sim­ul­tan­eously, with­in their well-matched des­tin­a­tions, tour­ists will find ful­fill­ment of their own needs for exper­i­ence, trans­form­a­tion, and memory.

Loc­al com­munit­ies in des­tin­a­tions should be empowered to reclaim their nar­rat­ives; speak about their glor­ies, hurts, and vis­ions through all their nuances, and give voice to those who can­not speak. The rhythms of a story writ­ten loc­ally will bet­ter match the rhythms of the place, its people, and its nat­ur­al envir­on­ment. And a loc­al story will bet­ter define the para­met­ers of the unique exper­i­ence offered there before travel even begins. A des­tin­a­tion’s essence is simply a home essence. It exis­ted before tour­ism was ever ima­gined — before a home became a “des­tin­a­tion” — and, if main­tained, it will exist with or without tour­ism long after. And yet it will extend a warm wel­come to those who would appre­ci­ate and respect it.

Also see Eva Moss­ber­g’s “GT” Insight
“Host com­munit­ies are at the core of tomorrow’s sus­tain­able tourism”

How­ever, host com­munit­ies often do not feel fit to por­tray their own essence. So stor­ies are told by third parties. Travel journ­al­ists and con­tent cre­at­ors have their angles; tour guides, des­tin­a­tion and hotel man­agers and mar­keters anoth­er set of angles; and people one meets each have their own. Only if hosts’ stor­ies are told in an undis­tor­ted and accur­ate way can all of us be cer­tain that their value will endure. 

Were they ever to be embed­ded in everybody’s vis­ion — host and vis­it­or alike — through edu­ca­tion so that they may influ­ence pur­pose, invalu­able loc­al per­spect­ives on place might indeed be enhanced and evolved through a sym­bi­os­is of loc­al and for­eign appre­ci­ation and inter­pret­a­tion. Sus­tain­able, respons­ible, and flourishing.

Education: A means to happiness?

The vir­tu­al­isa­tion of both tour­ism storytelling and edu­ca­tion was a nas­cent trend before the pan­dem­ic. It has since taken off in scope and scale. In my work as a uni­ver­sity teach­er, vir­tu­al tools have blen­ded into a new routine of ana­lys­is and dis­cus­sion of travel stor­ies with my stu­dents dur­ing online classes. Aca­demia bears an enorm­ous respons­ib­il­ity to pre­pare future tour­ism pro­fes­sion­als with a mind­ful and respons­ible approach to tour­ism. Gen­er­al well-being is not merely a com­pet­it­ive advant­age, but the warp and weft of weav­ing des­tin­a­tions’ and trav­el­lers’ stor­ies. Mak­ing stu­dents equipped and self-con­fid­ent to take on com­pil­ing, for­mu­lat­ing, and pub­lish­ing true stor­ies is the most sus­tain­able role aca­demia can play for the future of tour­ism we are envi­sion­ing today.

As in a travel exper­i­ence, if there is emo­tion­al involve­ment in a story well told, the story has trans­form­at­ive power. Thus the storytelling paradigm can become the prism through which tour­ism stu­dents oper­ate in the future. Through stor­ies and storytelling, stu­dents will enjoy, learn, and under­stand more. To achieve this, teach­ers need to put on storytellers’ hats. Tour­ism edu­ca­tion needs to be per­ceived as a jour­ney; a trans­form­at­ive, mean­ing­ful, pur­pose­ful, change-her­ald­ing, and fun trip. We achieve this through enga­ging stu­dents in sim­u­lated or real storytelling-related com­munity and envir­on­ment­al pro­jects, such as with loc­al NGOs, busi­nesses, or travel journ­al­ists. Being involved in writ­ing a des­tin­a­tion story turns stu­dents into caring advoc­ates for the des­tin­a­tion. This is even more reward­ing in the con­text of inter­na­tion­al groups of students. 

Also see Bjørn Z Eke­lun­d’s “GT” Insight
“In the eye of the behold­er: How to cre­ate valu­able tour­ism experiences”

So, do I plead guilty to accus­a­tions of build­ing an army of like-minded tour­ism pro­fes­sion­als? Gladly, if stu­dents see them­selves in a high­er light.

Admit­tedly, tour­ism edu­cat­ors have organ­isa­tion­al bound­ar­ies around intro­du­cing the well-being and storytelling agenda. We can­not simply devote entire courses to this aim, but our aca­dem­ic free­dom allows us to sneak it in and blend this agenda into exist­ing ones. Then, the tour­ism expert­ise and inher­ent know­ledge of a destination’s heart­beat, its rhythm, are uni­fied in favour of sus­tain­able tourism.

Never-ending stories … (no conclusions)

We are stories. 

Our pur­pose, sat­is­fac­tion, and hap­pi­ness depend on our stories. 

We tell stor­ies around camp­fires, at home gath­er­ings, even to ourselves when we are alone. 

It makes me won­der wheth­er we could meas­ure tour­ism suc­cess through stor­ies and memor­ies told in their own unique and equally val­id ways by all of a des­tin­a­tion’s stake­hold­ers. What if memor­ies and stor­ies were the goal of the nar­rat­ive exper­i­ences we cre­ate for destinations?

How do we sup­port our future tour­ism pro­fes­sion­als in build­ing val­ues of grate­ful­ness, truth­ful­ness, and fellowship?

Or is that a dif­fer­ent story?

What do you think? Share a short anec­dote or com­ment below. Or write a deep­er “GT” Insight. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog wel­comes diversity of opin­ion and per­spect­ive about travel & tour­ism because travel & tour­ism is everyone’s business.

Fea­tured image (top of post): Story time with Mum; a frame­work for hap­pi­ness? By Liana Mikah (CC0) via Unsplash.

About the author

Ivana Dam­njan­ović is a sus­tain­able tour­ism expert with a dec­ade of exper­i­ence cur­rently serving as vice-dean for inter­na­tion­al cooper­a­tion at the Fac­ulty of Health and Busi­ness Stud­ies, Singidunum Uni­ver­sity, Ser­bia. Dr Dam­njan­ović advoc­ates enhanced stu­dent edu­ca­tion­al exper­i­ences through “the pro­lif­er­a­tion and trans­fer­ab­il­ity of teach­ing meth­ods and applic­ab­il­ity of the acquired knowledge”.

An ambas­sad­or for “Good Tour­ism” Insight Part­ner Plan­et Hap­pi­ness, Dr Dam­njan­ović’s aca­dem­ic interests include com­munity well-being; well­ness through recre­ation, adven­ture, and nature-based tour­ism; regen­er­at­ive tour­ism; sus­tain­able tour­ism in pro­tec­ted areas; and tour­ist exper­i­ences, storytelling, inter­pret­a­tion, and their edu­ca­tion­al aspects.