There’s a process to hitchhiking. First, you’ve got to decide that you want to get somewhere other than where you are. Then you have to muster the determination to actually leave your present location. All trips start with a determination that’s serious enough to get you off your butt and moving. You may have a specific destination in mind. It could just be a direction that you want to head in. Either way, you’ll have to conquer stagnation and sometimes even risk stability to get there.

After that, you have to pack what you’ll need. It’s always best to reach a balance in packing. Certain things are essential, such as flashlight, towel, toothbrush, toothpaste, lightweight emergency food, and water. But then again, you may be walking a lot in rough weather from a place you get stuck in. The difference between a 30 or 80 pound pack could end up being the difference between comfort or exhaustion, heat stroke, frostbite, and even death. But so could a one pound sweater that you thought unnecessary and left behind. Pack wisely.

You’ll also want a map. Other folks have been to the places you want to get to and traveled in the directions you want to go in. Maps exist for nearly every piece of road in the world. They all use universal symbols. It doesn’t matter where you’re from or what language you speak. Everyone knows that a bigger dot means a bigger city and that a thicker line connotes a major highway. You can travel uninformed in unfamiliar territory if you want to. You can even make your own trail or road through wilderness. Folks used to do it all the time in the olden days. Folks used to suffer greater hardships and die younger back then too. Luckily, many of those people made maps of the roads they built. Reading them can save us modern folk a lot of time, energy, and even disaster. It can help you to live longer and more comfortably than people did in the olden days.

It’s best to start a long hitchhiking trip from the on-ramp of a major highway. Don’t stand right out on the highway itself. There is a good reason why this is illegal. It’s very dangerous for the highway traffic as well as the hitchhiker. The chances of you getting crushed into eternity by a 70 m.p.h. vehicle paying strict attention to its own process are a lot greater on the highway itself than on the entrance ramp. A car entering a ramp at 25 m.p.h. is going to be immediately aware that you’re safely on the shoulder looking for a ride. It will have a much greater ability to pull over without killing you, its own passengers, or fellow vehicles than a 70 m.p.h. highway car would.

Get to the highway or main road as quickly and easily as possible. Standing on a barely traveled road in a rural area where the drivers are unfamiliar with you can last long enough for you to become vulture food. Hitching on a main city street is usually unproductive and can be dangerous as well. The highway or main road is probably close enough to your starting point so that you can get a ride from a friend, take a local bus, or even walk.

Once you are wisely packed and on an entrance ramp, you’re going to need patience. You can put yourself on a main road, be properly packed and intelligently discriminating about which cars you get into. That’s brilliant. It doesn’t change the fact that sometimes you’ll get passed by hundreds of cars over a period of many hours before someone stops for you. It won’t change the fact that a driver who initially seems like fun may turn into a downer, or worse, after a half hour’s acquaintance.

Most of the time good luck will favor you. It is mostly good people who will pull their car over to help a stranger, in the first place. You still have to be vigilant, discriminating, and patient—full time. That way you’re prepared for anything.

Prepared does not mean paranoid or even afraid. It means aware. Have fun. Travel should be a joyful process. If you think that every car pulling over for you will have an axe-murderer driving it, you should take the bus. (Unfortunately, your odds of meeting that axe-murderer may not drop much on the bus.)

If you live through many years of hitchhiking, you’ll eventually get what is called “a feel for the road.” You’ll have a better instinct for the best times to be on which roads, what equipment to carry, whose car to not get into, and so on. Rides will seem to come more easily. This is still no time to let your positive attitude, awareness, or vigilance fall asleep.

Novice or adept, neither the road, its vehicles, nor (of course) its human participants owe you anything—nor are any of these under your direct control.

At its best, hitchhiking is a joint venture where you and your hosts can benefit each other. In such instances, taking the ride can be a joy. If you’re not grateful, if you’re arrogant, or if you’re not aware of each and every situation you get into—it can certainly be otherwise.

Obviously, the above process can apply to any number of procedures besides hitchhiking.

Pick a place you want to get to.

Prepare wisely. Read a map.

Hit the road with your eyes open.

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