In lifestyle medicine, we know the script: eat better, move more, manage stress, sleep well, connect with others. Many of us know what to do. But knowledge alone does not create transformation. What does? Identity. That quiet internal voice that tells us who we are and what we are capable of. Research by Daphna Oyserman and colleagues shows that identity drives behavior more powerfully than intention or willpower. People act in alignment with who they believe they are. If someone sees themselves as a hiker, hiking feels natural. If someone sees themselves as “not athletic,” the most evidence-based exercise prescription in the world will struggle to stick. The good news: Identities are not fixed. They are dynamic, context-sensitive, and capable of shifting.

So the real question becomes: What creates the conditions for identity to shift? As a physician and founder of a global wellness adventure travel company, I have had a front-row seat to watching identity become flexible in real time. What I observe consistently aligns with behavioral science research: Immersive travel offers specific, identifiable conditions that make identity shift possible. And when identity shifts, behavior change stops being a struggle. It becomes a natural expression of who someone is.

Seven conditions that make identity flexible

• Mastery of meaningful, challenging goals: Specific, challenging goals outperform vague ones, and successfully completing a difficult goal builds belief in one’s own capability. Travel creates conditions for real mastery: hiking a volcano, completing a multi-day trek, navigating an unfamiliar place. Each success becomes evidence. And evidence reshapes identity.
• Environmental disruption: Nearly half of our daily behaviors are habitual, cued automatically by our environment. Your couch signals Netflix. Your kitchen counter signals snacking. When we travel, those cues disappear and a window opens for new patterns to form.
• Novelty: Novelty activates the hippocampus and triggers dopamine release, priming the brain for learning and motivation. New landscapes, new foods, new conversations, these wake the brain up and make internal models more updateable. When internal models update, identity can update too.
• Awe: fMRI research shows that awe reduces activity in the default mode network, the brain’s self-referential circuit responsible for rumination and rigid self-concept. Research by Dacher Keltner and Paul Piff shows that awe increases openness, patience, and prosocial behavior, and creates what researchers call the “small self,” a felt sense of connection to something larger than ourselves. In that state, rigid self-stories loosen their grip.
• Nature: Decades of research show that natural environments reduce stress physiology, restore attention, and improve well-being. Time in forests has been shown to increase natural killer cell activity for more than 30 days after exposure. When the nervous system is regulated, the mind quiets. And in that quiet, new identities can take root.
• Belonging and emotional safety: Belonging is a fundamental human need. When we feel emotionally safe and witnessed, we become more willing to try new things, take risks, and shift behavior. Small-group experiences accelerate belonging. And when others begin to see us differently, we begin to see ourselves differently.
• Temporal landmarks and liminality: Research on the Fresh Start Effect shows that temporal landmarks create psychological openings for change by separating the old self from the new. Anthropologist Victor Turner described liminality as the threshold state between who we were and who we are becoming. Immersive travel creates natural liminal space. In that in-between state, old identity loosens before new identity has fully formed. That is precisely where transformation becomes possible.

What this looks like in practice

I have watched these conditions work together to create profound identity shifts. A woman joined one of my trips while still living with the residual effects of surgery. Her identity had centered around being post-operative. After finding herself at the front of the group on our hikes, she began to see herself differently. She was a hiker. Another woman shared that her young adult children saw her as cautious and risk-averse. After hiking a volcano and riding an ATV, she came home feeling powerful and daring for the first time in years. These are not fitness stories. These are identity stories. And when identity expands, behavior change does not require willpower. It becomes a natural expression of who someone is.

Bringing these conditions home

These conditions do not require a passport.

• Practice awe intentionally. Take a walk and actively look for something that stops you: light through trees, a vast sky, architecture. Even brief awe exposures create measurable physiologic and psychological shifts.
• Frame identity-based goals. Instead of “I should exercise,” try “I am becoming someone who moves my body.” Identity predicts action more reliably than intention.
• Disrupt the environment. Walk a new route. Rearrange a workspace. Small contextual shifts weaken old habit cues and create openings for new behavior.
• Spend time in nature. Even 20 minutes reduces cortisol and restores attention. Aiming for 120 minutes per week is where research shows measurable well-being benefits begin.
• Choose meaningful challenges. Not “lose 10 pounds,” but pursue something that requires you to see yourself differently.

A different kind of conversation

Information changes knowledge. Motivation ignites intention. But identity change drives transformation. The conditions that make identity flexible are identifiable and reproducible. They exist in immersive travel in a concentrated form. But they are also available in daily life, in smaller doses, for anyone willing to seek them out. Understanding these conditions may open new conversations about what actually creates lasting change, not just in our patients, but in ourselves. That shift, from knowing to being, is where it begins.

Stacey Funt is a practicing radiologist at Northwell Health, a National Board Certified Health and Wellness Coach, and founder of LH Adventure Travel, a boutique wellness adventure travel company. She curates small group immersive travel experiences for women that combine movement, nature, cultural connection, and community in awe-inspiring settings around the world.

Dr. Funt lectures nationally on physician well-being and has spoken at professional conferences on lifestyle medicine and immersive travel as a catalyst for behavior change. Her writing explores how immersive travel can support healing and transformation, how physicians can build meaningful careers beyond traditional roles, and how experiences of awe may play a central role in lifestyle medicine. Her work has appeared on KevinMD and in Go World Travel Magazine, including guidance for women traveling internationally.

She shares insights on wellness and travel through Instagram, LinkedIn, and on Facebook via her personal page, Stacey Funt, and her company page, LH Adventure Travel.