1KHO 916: There is Life After Grief and Loss | Barry Hoffner, Belonging to the World

Ginny Yurich (0:00)

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Hey, friends, welcome back to the 1000Hours Outside Podcast. And if you are new here, I'm Ginny Yurich, and I'm so glad you found us. Today's guest has been to 192 of the 193 countries in the world. Barry Hoffner has traveled just about everywhere, and the story of why he did it is not what I expected. After the sudden loss of his wife, Jackie, Barry eventually set out on this enormous journey around the world. And yes, we talk about some incredible places in the whole fascinating world of extreme travel that I didn't even know existed. But this conversation is also about grief, connection, taking chances, and what can happen when you're willing to step back into life after it has changed in ways you never wanted. His new book is called Belonging to the World, and I think you're really going to enjoy this one. Here's Barry Hoffner.

Here we go.

My name is Ginny Yurich, the founder of 1000 Hours Outside. We're going to be talking today about life with grief, after grief, during grief, traveling, trying to sort of figure out what are the lessons and who am I going to be after something tragic happens. And the author of a brand new book called Belonging to the World, an author who has been around the world to 192 out of 193 countries. Am I correct?

Barry Hoffner (3:51)

That is correct. Yes, I'm only missing one.

Ginny Yurich (3:53)

Only missing one. Barry Hoffner, welcome.

Barry Hoffner (3:56)

Thank you very much. It's great to be here, Ginny. I appreciate it.

Ginny Yurich (3:59)

So this book came out in March. It's called Belonging to the World's Gorgeous Book, A Journey from Grief to Connection in Every Country on Earth. And I would imagine it's an interesting situation to be in, to go in, to talk to someone on all these podcasts. And I know you talk in person as well. And you're sharing just this grief stricken story to someone you just met six minutes ago.

But your story does kick off with the hopes of this sort of emptiness season of travel with your wife. And you had met during travel. And, you know, there were some things that happened in the middle, like she was engaged, you know, our timing didn't match up. But you end up with this woman that you love and you travel. And then there is a sudden loss. You're not there. You're apart. You're both doing a little bit of your own travel for things that you're interested in. So can you talk about the part of basically reliving this and having these conversations kind of over and over again for the purpose of talking about your book? Has it been harder than you thought? Has it been healing?