<p>This paper re-examines transformative tourism at a conceptual crossroads as the field moves toward 2050. While transformative tourism has been predominantly theorised as positive self-change, centred on learning, well-being, and personal growth, mounting planetary instability and social inequality expose the limits of this inward orientation. Adopting a future-oriented conceptual approach, the paper integrates transformative tourism, mobilities theory, and tourism ethics to reconceptualise transformation as moral-relational repositioning triggered by spacetime displacement. It develops an integrative framework in which transformation unfolds through three interconnected processes: moral orientation reconfiguration, relational repositioning within a Self-Other-World configuration, and responsibility as a non-linear post-return trajectory. The analysis demonstrates that transformation is often ethically demanding rather than emotionally uplifting, particularly under conditions of crisis, inequality, and ecological fragility. By shifting attention from experience optimization to moral endurance and shared responsibility, the paper advances transformative tourism theory and positions it as moral infrastructure for living ethically with others in an unstable world.</p>