About Me

Hello there!

Welcome to The Cure for Curiosity, a travel blog! I’m Julia Williams, the founder of The Cure for Curiosity.

Julia Williams

I’m a thirty-something travel addict living in North Carolina who has explored 90+ countries and is always following my curiosity into my next adventure.

I created The Cure for Curiosity during an around the world trip in 2015 to share tips, tricks, and strategies to help fellow travelers, like you, learn how to wonder less and wander more. A few things you should know about me:

• I believe in living life to the fullest.
• I believe in working hard to get what you want.
• I believe there is always a solution to every problem – you just have to find it.

Keep your dreams alive, and let’s make them a reality.

My Story

Chapter 1: The Growing Up Years

The bulk of my early life was spent with my parents and sister in the Midwest – Ohio to be exact – with a few years in Tennessee. We did some traveling around the United States and had some exposure to international life.

In fact, my father’s job was based out of the UK for a few years and brought all kinds of visitors our way. Dinner with someone from Scotland, Australia, Japan… this was totally normal! Then, during my teen years, we went and spent a couple of summers in London.

This gave me my first, addicting taste of international life and travel. We jumped around to a few key cities within Europe, including a Mediterranean cruise. Life would never be the same!

What I Learned: I love exploring new places and meeting new people. I want to travel more. There’s so much to see and do!

Chapter 2: Studying Abroad in College + Grad School

When I turned 18, I went away to Florida State University, studying Marketing and International Business, with a minor in Hispanic Marketing Communications.  As part of my studies, I had to study abroad.  As such, I went off to Valencia, Spain for 4 months.

Preparing to study abroad in the fall, I spent a summer working 2 full time jobs – 1 low paying marketing internship for experience and 1 evening job at a restaurant to actually make money to save to travel!   That’s right, I spent 80+ hours a week working to make sure money wouldn’t be my barrier during my time in Europe.

While in Spain, and I meandered all around Western Europe and Egypt before, during, and after my study abroad. The travel addict in me was fueled.  This inspiration followed me into the early years of my marketing career balancing a full time job and traveling.

When I went back to grad school in the evenings for my MBA at Elon University, while working full time, I made sure to plan my International Business class according to my interests.  This class took me to Vietnam and Singapore, visiting businesses and government entities to learn more about life and business abroad.

Life Lessons: Hard work pays off. Anything is possible. The world is a magical place!

Travel Skills: Trip planning. Travel resources. Budget travel. Hostels.

Chapter 3: Taking a Year Off Work to Travel the World

At this point in my life, I had been to 39 countries on 6 continents, perhaps what you might call a travel enthusiast. Okay, okay… travel addict is probably more appropriate.

During every trip I had taken, I always met those crazy “Gap Year” travelers who are on the road for 6 – 12 months to wherever the wind may blow.  This got me daydreaming about being able to do the same.

After careful contemplation and realizing I’m not getting any younger (shockingly!), I finally took the leap and left my corporate job in March 2015 to discover more of the world. While making the decision was nerve-racking, I was more afraid of missing the opportunity of doing so and always wondering “what if”.  So, off I went.

My original plan was to be back by Christmas, but after spending 5 months in Northern and Eastern Europe, I pushed my timeline back. From Europe, I went to the Middle East and Northern Africa before flying over to Asia and spending some time in Australia and New Zealand.

All in all, I spent March 2015 to April 2016 with just a backpack fulfilling this crazy dream.  During this time is also when I set up The Cure for Curiosity.  I spent my free time learning about running a website, travel writing, and all that comes with it – a great addition to my marketing skills arsenal!

Life Lessons: You’ll never know if you don’t try. Follow your curiosities. Live your dreams. Take that leap of faith. You only get one chance to do it.

Travel Skills: Solo travel. Female travel. Travel gear. Staying safe abroad. Packing light. Long term travel. Couchsurfing.

Chapter 4: Living the Digital Nomad Life

Upon returning from my around the world trip, I quickly landed in a great job to ease back into “real life” working remotely as head of marketing for a Canadian company.

As it turns out, returning to “real life” was harder than I thought.  Going from the constant stimulation of travel and being surrounded by people to working remotely, in my one bedroom apartment, driving my car everywhere, alone, was underwhelming to say the least. I decided to spice up my life again.

To combat the quiet “work from home” life, I spoke to my manager, and then took my career on the road with me. I headed out on the Great American Road Trip to the Western part of the United States and up into Canada, plus a few side trips to Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Colombia, etc.

Working remotely, in a concrete 8-5 pm job, created a whole new type of travel for me – the digital nomad life. It made internet indispensable, along with having a quiet place to work, things I did not worry about previously.

Life Lessons: You don’t always have to choose between having a career and travel.  How amazing the United States is!

Travel Skills: Digital Nomad travel. Planning epic road trips. House sitting. The perks of slow travel.

Chapter 5: Balancing Corporate America and Travel

After a year and a half of the digital nomad lifestyle, I came back to North Carolina, where I am currently based.

I have continued to grow in my career, working full time in marketing in the software, technology, and data spaces, ranging from startups to international enterprises, while continuing to fuel my passion for travel and growing The Cure for Curiosity.

Life Lessons: Never stop learning and growing. Balancing real life, travel, and relationships.

Travel Skills: Maximizing vacation time. Luxury travel.

As time moves on, I can never seem to get enough of traveling to unknown places, encountering foreign languages and foods, meeting people who in many ways on the surface are so different from me but underneath share many similarities, discovering amazing architecture, and natural wonders.

Join me in making life an adventure!

– Julia