While traveling alone through Europe and Israel over the past several months, I found that if I didn’t try to meet new people, it wouldn’t happen.

This is the bejeweled and flaming double-edged-sword that is traveling alone: it’s entirely up to you how the journey plays out.

I spent many nights roaming Lisbon, Naples, Tel Aviv, with nothing but my thoughts.

Sometimes I wish I had an old friend to laugh with.

Yet I drew inspiration from these nocturnal wanderings, from the people watching, the shadows and streetlights, and the darkness which would slowly fall, pervade, and change these ancient cities.

The freedom of choice goes both ways — when you want to meet somebody it’s rather simple: Talk to someone. Ask a question. Be a friend.

Traveling alone taught me about myself, about people, about human connection. I appreciate being alone. But I love people, too.

If we are open and enjoy the company of others, life will comprise meeting new people everywhere we go. This lends one’s experience a refreshed vividness and also an unbroken reminiscence — those who enter one’s life just as easily depart.

I constantly think about the people I met this summer. Time passes, yet the memories we make stay with us, a brief flow of time that travels in this body, this soul, wherever we go.

I find the idea of impermanence in one another’s world a beautiful thought.

The details of the people we meet might fade away, and perhaps we remember nothing but the look in their eye. That often conveys more than what we can say with words.

Isn’t it interesting to meet somebody new, an entire universe unto itself that takes time to understand. Often that time escapes us — our worlds diverge, and our lives continue.

There’s social media, our digital persona which highlights our accomplishments, perhaps what we love about life and want to communicate.

I wonder: Were dating, relationships, and time spent together deeper, more curious, perhaps even more honest, without that digital presence?

Social media is a tool. In a positive light we can use it as an avenue of creativity and inspiration. But it isn’t life. Or maybe it is?

What is life?

I can tell you what I like, what I do, how I see the world. But it takes time to understand somebody’s vibe, their essence, their nature.

Yet that’s what makes us, us — not the things we do but who we are, the endlessly expanding universe that is our soul which has its own planets and stars and laws of gravity.

We cross paths with countless others throughout our journey and shed just a sliver of light into the depths of our world, only what we’re willing to share.

I remember the eyes, for they are what struck me deep.

The eyes possess the changing light of day, varied colors, unfathomable depth which plunges below the surface of reality.

If I’m really looking, your eyes will look back at me; I might see what you see. In that we share something, perhaps restored faith in the mystery; perhaps the will to carry on.

In the eyes are the stars, for they burn as remnants of the past; fire, not the swaying flame but the fervor to be, the warmth, the glow, the desire.

The smile in your eyes — that’s who I want to know. That’s what we remember. That’s what I’m seeking in myself.