Ever since I started as an elementary school student, I’ve linked effort to success. As a child, my self-esteem was strongly tied to everything I could accomplish and my point of activity. If I didn’t do anything productive, I felt worthless. .
I carried this confidence well into high school until I had an eye-opening experience while reading abroad.
Throughout top-tier school and college, I’m a typical achiever: a top honor roll, a GPA above 4. 0, and worry that any and all extracurricular activities may be compatible with my schedule.
If my time wasn’t marked by an endless to-do list, I felt like I was tiring my days.
While pursuing a double elementary degree at a small liberal arts school in Ohio, I had an amazing opportunity to study in Buenos Aires, Argentina. As a low-income first-generation student from West Virginia, it seemed like an unprecedented opportunity to delight. in the world.
I thought I would spend six months learning Spanish and exploring South America, but I didn’t expect this experience to be a catalyst to replace my way of thinking about education and my identity.
In the U. S. , many of us are conditioned to stay busy from a young age. For better or worse, this desire to rush is ingrained in the fabric of our culture. Since I had traveled a bit before moving to Argentina, this U. S. hegemony was everything. I knew.
In Argentina, however, this “active culture” is non-existent.
This was one of the first things I discovered when I enrolled in courses at two local universities in Buenos Aires.
Back in the U. S. , my conversations with my colleagues focused on our charging point. We spent walks in elegant conversations and lunches to talk about any homework we needed to finish until the end of the night, and that was general to us.
However, in Argentina, no one wore the activity as a badge of honor. In fact, if I talked too much about what I had to do, my new friends would start to worry.
“What the hell are you doing for fun?” They asked me questions and many times I didn’t have an answer.
At times when there was a pause in the conversation, I began to think about why I felt the desire to be busy and the effect it had on my intellectual health. I began to loosen my grip on some of those minds during my studies in Argentina. .
During my studies in Argentina, some other area in which I have become less worried and pressured by time and how I controlled it.
As a Type A student with a busy schedule, my school days were dictated through my paper planner and Google calendar. I cultivated one legal responsibility after another as if I was achieving a symphony of high-achieving people.
I would be perfectly angry if my schedule was altered, and I had little tolerance for the concept of life being unpredictable.
In Argentina, however, I learned that time and punctuality are relative. During my months in Buenos Aires, almost nothing went as planned. Buses were late, schedules seemed like suggestions, and friends never showed up for coffee dates as promised.
At first, this lack of punctuality and reliability was irritating. I had no way to plan when everything around me was so unpredictable. I was frustrated because I felt like I had no control over my situation.
In life, we feel like we’re in control of our situation. However, in reality, we are powerless in the face of conditions that are beyond us.
No matter how hard I tried to get my instructor on time or the bus to be on time, there’s literally nothing I can do about it.
During my studies in Buenos Aires I learned that there is no point in insisting on such things. I began to perceive barriers and what it means to settle for the things I can’t change.
No matter where you live, life is full of stressors. However, one of the most rewarding aspects of the adventure is that it shows us how other communities deal with inconveniences and problems.
As a student in Buenos Aires, I learned that I didn’t want to approach my disorders from an American perspective. Instead of running to exhaustion and dying on every hill, I had the strength to let things go.
It wasn’t all my struggle and I stopped fighting them as they were. I’m still giving myself the grace to adapt to the rhythms of this new mood, however I began to glimpse my stay in Argentina.
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