When you spend 3 years of your life in a different city from where your family home is, you have a lot of time to think. Time to think about what your plans are for the future, what you miss at home and how much you miss everything you have been used to, especially family and friends. Time to think about what you are leaving behind and what you are headed toward.
This solo experience has always been something I looked forward to, even though some people think I must be crazy for liking it. Every day I find myself analysing some new part of my life. This journey, I have thought a lot about how lucky I am to have grown up in my small city in South Australia. But it wasn’t always this way. When I neared the end of my final year of high school, I was scared of the future and the unknown. After 13 years of schooling I did not know any other way of life, I was excited for what may come, but I also realized I would have to leave my home and travel to a much bigger city and survive completely alone.
I had already arranged a “Gap Year” so I could travel to USA and work as a counselor with Camp America, for anyone reading this that may be considering doing something similar my advice would be to do it, you will forever be grateful and will grow personally from the experience.
Fast forward to my first year at university and I was dying to go home. I remember spending hours on the phone to my mum at home whilst she supported me and tried to help me deal with the loneliness and constant feeling of being homesick. I have been fortunate to make some fantastic lifelong best friends that helped me through the downtimes, I put my mum at the very top of that list and cannot thank her enough for the support and unconditional love she has given me through all the good times and bad. My first year at University was spent living in a single bed room in a Uni accommodation building. Whilst there was a great deal of fun had here, it certainly made me so much more thankful for the place that I came from.
I am always fighting back tears whenever I leave Adelaide and head back to Sydney. Despite how desperately I wanted to leave after high school, I will always be tied to my hometown. I can’t go anywhere in Adelaide without being overcome with eighteen years worth of memories. My idea of “home” is this undeniable combination of memory and reality that I will always hold close.
My mother always says “You never know what you’ve got until it’s gone,” and I certainly learned that after moving away. Lucky for me, she also says “You can always go home.” It will never really be gone; after all, home is where my heart is
So, to sum this all up: Do not miss out on great opportunities that present themselves because you are scared to leave home, you will always come back, you will always remember the great times and everything else that went together to make your home important. However, your life will be much richer from the opportunities you will have by discovering the world through your own eyes.
Do not be a stranger to your home, but do not be buried under the memories of it either!
Till next time.
This solo experience has always been something I looked forward to, even though some people think I must be crazy for liking it. Every day I find myself analysing some new part of my life. This journey, I have thought a lot about how lucky I am to have grown up in my small city in South Australia. But it wasn’t always this way. When I neared the end of my final year of high school, I was scared of the future and the unknown. After 13 years of schooling I did not know any other way of life, I was excited for what may come, but I also realized I would have to leave my home and travel to a much bigger city and survive completely alone.
I had already arranged a “Gap Year” so I could travel to USA and work as a counselor with Camp America, for anyone reading this that may be considering doing something similar my advice would be to do it, you will forever be grateful and will grow personally from the experience.
Fast forward to my first year at university and I was dying to go home. I remember spending hours on the phone to my mum at home whilst she supported me and tried to help me deal with the loneliness and constant feeling of being homesick. I have been fortunate to make some fantastic lifelong best friends that helped me through the downtimes, I put my mum at the very top of that list and cannot thank her enough for the support and unconditional love she has given me through all the good times and bad. My first year at University was spent living in a single bed room in a Uni accommodation building. Whilst there was a great deal of fun had here, it certainly made me so much more thankful for the place that I came from.
I am always fighting back tears whenever I leave Adelaide and head back to Sydney. Despite how desperately I wanted to leave after high school, I will always be tied to my hometown. I can’t go anywhere in Adelaide without being overcome with eighteen years worth of memories. My idea of “home” is this undeniable combination of memory and reality that I will always hold close.
My mother always says “You never know what you’ve got until it’s gone,” and I certainly learned that after moving away. Lucky for me, she also says “You can always go home.” It will never really be gone; after all, home is where my heart is
So, to sum this all up: Do not miss out on great opportunities that present themselves because you are scared to leave home, you will always come back, you will always remember the great times and everything else that went together to make your home important. However, your life will be much richer from the opportunities you will have by discovering the world through your own eyes.
Do not be a stranger to your home, but do not be buried under the memories of it either!
Till next time.
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