Wherever You Go, There You Are: Failing Forward

Wherever You Go, There You Are, but You Can Pack Lighter

There’s a quote: “Wherever you go, there you are.” It’s something you’ll hear often in 12-step rooms, and it’s rooted in stoic thinking, later popularized by Jon Kabat-Zinn, a pioneer in mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR). It means you can’t run from yourself. Whether it’s a new job, a new relationship, or a new city, your thoughts, habits, and emotional patterns come with you.

That phrase echoed in my mind as I waited to board my plane at the Barcelona airport heading back to Newark, New Jersey. While nowhere near as architecturally stunning or culturally romantic as where I’d just been, it’s still home. And right now, I welcome the familiarity.

This trip through France and Spain wasn’t like any escape I’ve taken before. It was mostly a solo adventure (aside from brief moments with my wildly creative father in Cannes and a special friend in Barcelona). It was also my first time returning to Europe since losing my mother to cancer three months ago, and that grief followed me onto the plane.

European travel has long been entwined with my mother. I remembered our quiet walks through Lisbon’s cobbled streets, with Arabic and Spanish mosaic tiles surrounding us. I remembered the sunsets over the Tagus River, our trip to the Vatican,  and the best pizza of our lives on Spaccanapoli Street in Naples. These memories have shaped my map of Europe, colored by love and tension.

My parents escaped Budapest during the height of socialist rule as brave and idealistic immigrants from behind the Iron Curtain, and that boldness came with consequences. In the last decade, I’ve most associated Europe with my mother. She moved back to Hungary for retirement, and I visited her as often as I could with every PTO day saved. Each trip a kind of reunion and repair.

Our relationship was complicated. She was shaped by a harsher world than I’ll ever know, and I was shaped by a different one altogether. We didn’t speak the same emotional language, but somehow, traveling together softened us. Europe became neutral ground, a quiet space for moments of peace between us.

So while I took in the crisp blue waters of the French Riviera and the energy of El Born, there was a strange weightlessness in the air that didn’t match the heaviness I arrived with. And maybe that’s what this trip ended up being about… not just escape, but realizing what I don’t want to carry anymore.

When I packed for Nice from Newark, I brought grief and unfinished goodbyes, but I left some of that weight on the rocky turquoise shores of the Côte d’Azur.

Wherever You Go, There You Are: A Clinical Lens

From a therapeutic perspective, this phrase reflects what we often explore in session:

ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy)
ACT invites us to acknowledge that pain and difficult thoughts don’t go away just because we change our surroundings. The work is about building psychological flexibility and staying connected to your values even when discomfort shows up. You don’t escape discomfort, you move forward with gentleness and courage.

Psychodynamic & Attachment Therapy
Unexamined wounds repeat themselves. You can switch jobs, leave partners, move across oceans, and still end up in familiar emotional dynamics. That’s because the unfinished business isn’t outside of you. It’s in you. The therapeutic work is to make the unconscious conscious, and  awareness is the first step toward liberation.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
CBT teaches us that it’s not the situation itself that causes suffering, but our thoughts about it. You can change the city, the partner, the clothes, but if your inner dialogue stays the same, your symptoms follow. So the shift has to happen from the inside out.

In Your Own Healing Journey
“Wherever you go, there you are” is not meant to discourage. It’s an invitation to stop outsourcing peace to a place, person, or achievement and to start turning inward with honesty and compassion. Real change begins by meeting yourself as you are right now.

Failing Forward: A Clinical Reframe

In therapy, we often use the phrase failing forward. It means that the setback isn’t the opposite of progress. It’s part of it. This trip reminded me of that.

There were moments of nourishment, connection, laughter, and awe. But there were also lonely and compulsive moments when I slipped into old habits. But here’s the difference: I didn’t stay there. I noticed, got honest, and picked myself back up with greater ease than I used to. That’s what growth looks like in the real world. That’s the quiet miracle we don’t give ourselves enough credit for.

Emotional Minimalism: What I Didn’t Bring Home

One of the themes I return to often is emotional minimalism, which is the idea of clearing out the inner clutter that keeps us stuck in cycles of shame, fear, comparison, and distraction. We declutter our homes, but rarely examine the narratives and inherited beliefs weighing us down.

Somewhere between the beaches of Antibes and the streets of Barcelona, I realized how much fear I’ve been dragging behind me. Fear of aging alone and time running out. But I decided to leave some of it there. That’s the beauty of reframing and release. When you unsubscribe from outdated stories and make space for something new to bloom, healing becomes less about fixing and more about letting go of what no longer fits.

To You, If You’re Failing Forward

So yes, wherever you go, there you are. But if you’re willing to be honest with yourself and willing to look at the fall, and not just the landing, you can fail forward.

If you’ve stumbled recently, whether it’s emotionally, spiritually, or physically, you’re not alone. Falling means you’re human. But noticing it, speaking it, and responding with compassion? That’s forward, and that is healing.

Let that be enough for today.

Journaling Prompt:

How can I reframe my outdated idea of failure, and where did I actually fail forward this week?