Black Kids Abroad: The Mental Health Benefits of Blacks Traveling Young

Some of us have been blessed to travel abroad and spend part of our lives as nomads, globe-trotting and collecting life-changing experiences through travel.

As adults, we’re well aware of the benefits of travel; relaxation, an increased global awareness, and helping us find the purpose to our lives, to name a few. But, how many of us have realized that travel benefits kids as well?

Traveling with kids allows us to strengthen family bonds, provides kids with new experiences, and also prepares them to function as global citizens in the 21st century. According to Forbes.com, here are some of the reasons why traveling while Black and Young are so important.

1. Make them citizens of the world.

Children are more adaptable than we are, and the earlier we can expose them to otherness in all its various forms, the less likely they are to become solipsistic as they grow into their consciousness and power.

Sheltering them from the actual world might lead them to assume that the world they know is the only one that exists, except in fairy tales.

2. Get them to eat weird stuff.

There's nothing like hunger in a foreign land to make us appreciate what we have before us, and food is one of the most interesting and accessible ways to get to know a culture from the inside.

Won't eat fish at home, but will eat fish tacos on a beach in Mexico? Makes perfect sense.

3. Expose their brains to diverse languages.

Even if your kids don't try to speak the language of the country you're visiting, exposure to another language will help their brains develop English skills more rapidly. And a recent study shows that even limited exposure to a second language in infancy results in greater retention of phonological structure later.

4. Build their confidence and independence.

It never fails. Once your kid sees someone else go down the big slide or take the elevator alone, suddenly he or she is asking for the room key and permission to venture out alone.

If you're staying put for a while, kids can become fully integrated into new communities and adopt new habits in a very short time.

Even after you return home, those memories linger and influence what your children say and do, as well as how they treat others. Travel builds confidence as they make their way through unfamiliar territory, both physical and psychological.

5. Increase their tolerance for discomfort.

You don't have to be roughing it to hear the complaints. Maybe the pillow is too lumpy or there's no ice for the soda.

Or maybe there are mosquitoes buzzing in your ear all night or no tweezers to take out the splinter in your toe. Or perhaps the plane is just very, very late.

All of these anomalies are within the realm of possible travel experiences, and they're not necessarily bad. The challenges of discomfort will allow kids to problem-solve, to practice patience, and to express gratitude in new ways.

So, in all, book the flight for you and your little one. They’ll thank you for it later.

Jasmine Browley holds an MA in journalism from Columbia College Chicago, and has contributed to Ebony, Jet and MADE Magazine among others. So, clearly, she knows some stuff. Follow her digital journey @JasmineBrowley.