What traveling to all 197 countries taught Garrett Gravesen about himself and the world!
Garrett Gravesen left the country for the first time when he was 21. The recipient of the Courts Scholarship from UGA, he was entitled to an all expense- paid trip anywhere in the world. “You can put your finger on Atlanta on a globe. You spin it all the way around, and it’s the same longitude line as Hong Kong. So I kid you not, with a backpack and a dream, I went to Hong Kong. I had no job, and I had to figure it out,” he says.
Figure it out he did. He landed an internship with Merrill Lynch and spent the summer in equity sales. The experience proved to be his global entry into world travel. He spent the next summer in Kenya and stayed for a year, starting a nonprofit for children living with HIV and AIDS. In a few short years, Gravesen went from not having a passport to landing on multiple continents, all while confidently choosing his next stops.
Now 46, he says his secret to success is permitting himself to mess up. “Give yourself permission to be awful,” Gravesen says. You’re going to miss the trains, and you may miss the bus, but you’re going to end up in some random Italian restaurant with an 85-year-old grandmother, and you’re going to have the greatest meal of your life,” he says.
This philosophy of expecting the unexpected is how Gravesen came to be known as the guy with the tuxedo. On a trip to Antarctica, Gravesen became a victim of lost luggage. He arrived for a 10-day stint without anything other than the clothes on his back and a tuxedo in his carry-on that he had tossed in at the last minute to take a quirky photo with penguins. He spent the trip in the tux. “That tuxedo broke the ice and became the easiest conversation piece ever,” he says. From that point, the tuxedo went, intentionally, into Gravesen’s suitcase and became a conversation starter in countries all over the world.
As an in-demand public speaker, Gravesen has entertained audiences at companies such as Chick-fil-A, the NFL, the MLB and Coca-Cola by telling tales of travel but mostly of living a full life. He encourages people to embrace courage and step out of their comfort zones and redefine what’s possible in leadership and life. “I always say ‘the dash’ is the line on your tombstone that defines your life. What will you do with your dash?’”
Gravesen says it’s not a numbers game. It’s not traveling to all 197 countries, a milestone he completed in 2022, or visiting all 50 states. “It’s not about traveling farther; it’s about living fuller,” he says. “How do you soak up all this stuff in every visit, in every city, in every place?”
Before his father passed away in 2013, Gravesen asked him for words of wisdom he could hold onto. “He said, ‘I want you to do one thing you’d be insanely proud of and do it now.’” The statement encouraged Gravesen to continue his travel and speaking and to write a book as well. Published in 2017, 10 Seconds of Insane Courage is a guide for anyone standing in that split-second gap between courage and comfort. It’s a call to stop waiting for the “right time” and take the leap now.
These days, Gravesen says he’s driven by two things: legacy and significance. Whether he’s on a stage in front of thousands or buying a stranger a drink at a bar in Sierra Leone just to hear their story, Gravesen says the real prize was never the passport stamps. “For me, the greatest souvenir I got from travel was perspective. It’s the power of chance encounters; you can learn something from anyone if you just listen.”
garrettgravesen.com
@ggworldwide
