A message from my friend who is currently on exchange.

So I am kinda stealing this from CJ's blog. But it's because I love the strong advice it gives. Right now, we have a friend who is on exchange in Denmark. She sent a message with some good advice in it and I wanted to post it because it made me think about the whole exchange thing... I am beyond excited about all this of course, but its scary at the same time. 

"Being an exchange student. 

Before I left, every student I talked to told me that they would never regret their exchange, they had an amazing incredible experience, they wouldn’t change it for anything. 

The thing they don’t tell you, is, the reason they say this is because they have gone through it, they have been on the exchange. … Let me rephrase. On exchange, you learn to look at your life and love your life and love yourself and see how all the strange paths, however painful or however amazing, have lead you to where you are. You learn to live with no regrets, appreciating your home, your family, your friends, yourself, your culture, more than you could have ever thought possible. 

Why wouldn’t everyone go on exchange then? I mean you get all these great experiences, learn a new language, attain this incredibly rare perspective that is oh so fairly impossible to attain in one year, esspecially so young. You get the best year of your life, handed to you on a platter. 

The reason is, because it is freaking hard. This is the hardest year of anyones life. No one really tells you this. Most people left it out of the itinerary. This year you’re are about to go on, will be so so terrible at times, that you just want to give up and go home, that you just want to cry and eat chocolate all day. And sometimes we do. 

But hear me when I say this; you are the bravest people I know. Stepping blindly forward into this whirl wind of crazy experiences. Cheers to you all. Because you are the kids that make those old rotarians hopeful when they think of the future. You are the kids that make me proud to be apart of this generation. We are the kids brave enough to step, blindfolded off the highdive. We are the kids running, shouting and screaming for more life and more adventure. And after eleven months of this, we look back and see how much we have grown, and realize, we are the captain of our fait, the master of our souls. 

Cheers y’all. Have an incredible year."