What Thailand Gave Back to Me

There are places in the world that become part of your story.

Thailand has always been one of mine.

I’ve been there more times than I can count.

It’s one of those places that has never just been a destination for me. Every time I’ve gone, a different version of me has been waiting there.

The first time I visited was in 2020.

I was in love.

Back then, Thailand became the backdrop for one chapter of my life.

Then I went back in 2021.

Again in 2022.

And then in 2023.

Each trip carried a different version of me.

Some versions were dreaming.

Some were building.

Some were healing without even realizing they needed to.

When my relationship ended in 2023, I don’t think I realized how much of myself had quietly changed.

Not because Thailand had taken anything from me.

And not because that relationship defined my life.

But heartbreak has a way of making you question the woman you were before it happened.

Life kept moving.

I kept moving.

I built businesses.

I traveled the world.

I smiled.

I laughed.

I healed.

Or at least I thought I had.

Healing has a funny way of working.

Sometimes it’s loud.

Sometimes it’s so quiet you don’t even realize it’s happening until one day you wake up and notice you’ve become someone new.

So when I booked another trip back to Thailand this year, I wasn’t looking for closure.

I wasn’t trying to relive old memories.

I wasn’t searching for myself.

Honestly, I was just excited to return to one of my favorite places in the world.

Then I landed.

The moment I stepped off the plane in Bangkok, something shifted.

Not around me.

Inside me.

There was this heaviness sitting in my chest that I couldn’t explain.

It wasn’t fear.

It wasn’t excitement.

It felt like my spirit knew something my mind hadn’t caught up to yet.

I remember calling my best friend before I even left the airport.

“I don’t know what’s wrong,” I told her.

“Something feels off.”

Nothing had happened.

I had literally just landed.

But my intuition was louder than usual.

I’ve learned that when God whispers, I don’t always need to understand why. I just need to pay attention.

At the time, I questioned whether I should’ve even come. My family had been telling me not to travel because of everything happening around the world, and for a brief moment I wondered if maybe they were right.

Looking back now, I don’t think that feeling had anything to do with danger.

I think I was standing at the beginning of a transformation.

I just didn’t know it yet.

My best friend picked me up, and before I even had a chance to unpack, she wanted to go celebrate Songkran, Thailand’s New Year festival.

If you’ve never been, imagine thousands of people filling the streets with giant water guns, music, laughter, and absolute chaos.

It looked incredible.

But something inside me kept saying,

Don’t go.

I told her I wasn’t feeling it.

She convinced me anyway.

So I ignored my intuition.

Twenty minutes later, someone stole my camera.

Not my phone.

Not my wallet.

My camera.

The expensive one.

The one that held videos of my grandfather.

Conversations with my dad.

Video diaries I had made for myself over the years.

The camera could be replaced.

Those memories couldn’t.

I remember sitting there thinking,

“I’ve only been here a few hours. How could this trip already be falling apart?”

Then somehow...

It got worse.

I had booked an appointment to get my braids taken down and my hair washed.

Before booking, I specifically asked if they knew how to work with 4B hair.

They assured me they did.

Halfway through washing my hair, the stylist stopped.

She looked at me and said,

“I can’t do your hair.”

I honestly thought she was joking.

She wasn’t.

Then she told me she couldn’t even blow dry it because it would take too long and she had another client waiting.

So there I was.

Standing in a salon in another country with soaking wet hair, trying not to panic.

I ended up blow drying it myself with equipment that wasn’t made for my hair texture, praying I wasn’t about to damage years of growth.

I left frustrated.

Embarrassed.

Exhausted.

At that point, I honestly thought,

“Maybe I should’ve stayed home.”

The next day wasn’t much better.

I traveled almost an hour across Bangkok for another hair appointment I found on TikTok.

She told me it would take six hours.

It took fourteen.

Fourteen.

The hair I paid extra for shed everywhere.

I missed another day of Songkran.

Nothing was going according to plan.

But somewhere between losing my camera, blowing out my own hair, and sitting in that salon for fourteen hours...

I remembered something my best friend had taught me.

Or maybe I should say, something she lived.

I call it The Big Dog Theory.

Before my best friend moved to Thailand, she was bitten by a dog.

It shook her.

She almost gave up on moving altogether.

She had every reason to stay home.

Every reason to let fear convince her that maybe Thailand wasn’t meant for her.

But she kept going.

Today, she’s living the life she once prayed for.

She’s built an incredible career.

Worked with amazing brands.

Written a book.

Created a life that would’ve never existed if she had stopped because of one painful moment.

Watching her taught me something.

Sometimes the greatest resistance shows up right before the greatest breakthrough.

Whether you see that as spiritual, psychological, or simply part of pursuing something meaningful, I’ve found it to be true more often than not.

So I made a decision.

I wasn’t going to let one bad day define my entire trip.

I was going to keep showing up.

And somewhere along the way...

Everything changed.

I started taking care of myself in ways I hadn’t before.

I had one of the most thorough health checkups of my life.

Blood work.

Dental work.

Women’s health appointments.

Brain scans.

Spine scans.

I got facials.

Body treatments.

Found an amazing wax specialist.

Finally found someone who understood my lashes.

My skin started glowing.

My body felt lighter.

I wasn’t trying to escape my life.

I was investing in it.

Then we traveled.

Pattaya.

Back to Bangkok.

Bali.

And somewhere in the middle of all of it...

I realized I wasn’t becoming someone new.

I was remembering who I already was.

Bali gave me another reminder.

I unexpectedly ran into a friend from Los Angeles.

We’ve known each other for years.

Always just friends.

We spent an evening talking, laughing, dancing, and simply enjoying each other’s company.

Years ago, I probably would’ve confused attention with connection.

I might’ve ignored my own boundaries because I didn’t want the night to end.

But this version of me was different.

I knew exactly what I wanted this season to be.

I wanted peace.

I wanted clarity.

I wanted to honor the promises I’d made to myself before I ever got on that plane.

So I did.

Not because he wasn’t wonderful.

He was.

But because I had finally learned that respecting yourself isn’t about rejecting other people.

It’s about choosing yourself when it matters.

The rest of my trip became one long conversation with God.

I took myself to dinner.

I wandered through beautiful streets alone.

I spent hours at the spa.

I journaled.

I prayed.

I listened.

I stopped rushing.

I let silence teach me things that noise never could.

By the time I met back up with my best friend before flying home, we laughed, we cried, we prayed, and we thanked God for everything He had carried us through.

Not just the victories.

The disappointments too.

Because sometimes the disappointments are the very things that redirect us toward the life we’re actually meant to live.

People ask me all the time why I travel so much.

They think it’s because I love beautiful hotels.

Fine dining.

Luxury experiences.

And yes, I love all of those things.

But that’s never been why I travel.

I travel because every place teaches me something about myself.

Some places remind me to slow down.

Some places challenge me.

Some places stretch me.

And every now and then...

A place gives me something back that I didn’t even realize I’d lost.

Thailand did that for me.

Not because I went there searching for myself.

Because I had finally become the woman who was ready to receive herself again.

I don’t think I left pieces of myself in Thailand.

I think God used Thailand, over and over again, as the place where He introduced me to the next version of who I was becoming.

If there’s one thing I hope you take from my story, it’s this:

Trust your intuition.

Honor your boundaries.

Keep going when the beginning feels messy.

Don’t let one bad day convince you that the entire journey is ruined.

Sometimes your breakthrough is waiting on the other side of the day that almost made you quit.

Sometimes the place you return to isn’t there to remind you of who you were.

It’s there to introduce you to who you’ve become.

With love,

AuJené