Well-being: The essential companion

Throughout human history, major world thinkers of both the East and the West, from Laozi of Ancient China to Proust of modern France, have debated the benefits of voluntary travel away from usual domiciles. As de Botton (2002) observes, if our lives are dominated by a search for well-being, then “perhaps few activities reveal as much about the dynamics of this quest – in all its ardour and paradoxes – than our travels” (p. 9). These benefits are particularly relevant in contemporary times where arguably the desire of living to work has been replaced by merely working to live. The escape from this stressful life is obtained through the phenomenon of tourism as “society’s institutionalized means
of enabling fantasy and reality to be imperceptibly mixed” (Uzzell, 1984, p.85); in this way, tourism serves as a powerful vehicle for enhancing and restoring one’s well-being, despite its temporary and episodic nature.