1. How big the world really is.
You know how they say that it's such a small world? Well, don't believe them. The world is enormous, and I want to see every single bit of it. I want to be able to travel and experience the world, the cultures, the customs. I wonder how I'm ever going to find the time to do all this traveling, which brings me to my next point.
2. Take every single opportunity.
If each time I was too scared, too tired or had too much homework I turned down the chance to hang out with friends, go to the movies, go grocery shopping with Nicole or take a walk in the park, I would have missed out on so much here. Even if I was exhausted in the beginning, I said yes to everything. Not only did it help me with my french, but it created great memories too. When I had to make the choice between two things, I learned to look at my options and see which one would be a once in a lifetime opportunity, and I took that one even if it wasn't always the most fun at the time. By doing this, I got to experience so many things that I would have never seen, I guess you could say I "explored" the french culture.
3. Remember that thing that you spent forever worrying about 2 weeks ago? No? Well neither do I. That's because it didn't matter.
I waste so much energy on little things. I'm a worrier, but I've realized this year that those things that I worry about generally aren't worth the energy. Things are going to be ok, and I just have to learn to trust that. That doesn't mean I can just stand back and watch things turn out perfectly on their own, it means that I can just transfer the energy (yeah, throwing some physics in there) from worrying to actually solving the problem
4. Change happens.
People change, and I'm included. When I left home this year, I thought that when I would return everything would be the same. I think I realized that wasn't true when I saw that I changed as well. It wouldn't be fair for me to hold my life back home to the standard of not changing that I didn't live up to. Change happens, and that can be a good thing. Maybe I didn't change as much as I grew up, but I'm sure that I'm not the same little girl as the one who left home in September, and that's ok.
5. Give yourself some slack, because perfect doesn't exist.
Easier said than done, especially for me. I'm a diagnosed perfectionist, but if there's one thing I've learned from the french is that perfect doesn't exist. It's impossible to get a perfect score at school, because if you have a 20/20 it means that your perfect, and for them that's impossible. So, if I don't have the best grades in the class (which I don't), it's OK! I hold myself to an impossibly high standard, and if I don't succeed, I beat myself up about it. So I just need to cut myself some slack and relax, after all I don't hold others to standards like that.
Alright, I'm done for now, but in the meantime here are some photos of the past month or so!
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| PARIS! |
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| Fellow Mainers in Paris |
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PARIS |
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| Waffles in Belgium |
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| England! |
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| Manchester United |
Hello ! I'm in France right now on an exchange (with Rotary, not AFS), but I came across your blog and I've really enjoyed the parts I've read, and I appreciated this post a lot. I'm the same way in terms of being a perfectionist, and it's hard to accept that it's not the same here. I love it here, but it certainly can be overwhelming to try and deal with the difficulties here and also the problems from back home as well. Just the other day I accidentally misread the information for a Rotary meeting and arrived 15 minutes and felt horrible and apologized to everyone (and they all said it wasn't a big deal), but just the fact that it's something I wouldn't normally do made me freak out. Anyways, I've written more than I meant to, but in conclusion thank you for writing this post :)
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