A Reflection on Living Abroad

"I'm one of those people now" I thought to myself.

The other day I was thinking about my move to Germany, where I spent two years at university.

From context: I was studying in a dual degree co-op program where I studied 30 months in St. Catharines, Canada at the Goodman School of Business to receive a Bachelor of Business Administration and for 18 months in Oestrich-Winkel, Germany at the European Business School to receive a Bachelor of Science in General Management. In that time there were also two internships.

There have always been these people who I saw online or whose stories I’d read about living in some foreign country. They seemed to be living the most incredible life or at least be experiencing so many new things. I always wanted to become one of those people. I wanted to experience something so new.

Then one day I was walking to the grocery store in the village I live in, I reflected on my past several months and thought, “I’m one of those people now!” I had never thought of it in this way before for some reason. I had planned on moving to Germany since entering university. It was just a planned part of my next couple years.

These online people had something I didn’t have at that point when I used to think they were living the coolest life ever. It was the thrill of the unknown that I must have been seeking. I must have been curious about what it was like to live abroad because now as I am here, yes, it’s wonderful, but I still live much the same way I did back home.

On the other hand, the experience is exactly what I wanted.

I came with 15 friends in my program, which made the transition much easier, but in a simple form, I only moved from one developed country to another. People still do the same things here, just in slightly different ways sometimes. They eat, sleep, shower, study, workout, work, travel, etc… At the same time, all of the differences are exciting to experience.

When there’s something we don’t personally have or experience, we tend to imagine an augmented reality. The idea of moving to a European country is likely a dream for many people who haven’t yet experienced it. I’ve now done it for just four months, but I don’t want it to simply be a box checked on a list of things to accomplish.

Taking time to reflect on accomplishments, experiences, or failures can help us remember how far we’ve come and what we’ve learned along the way. When I was a kid who wanted to live in a foreign country, if I saw someone in my position now, I would have thought they were so cool. Now, as I am actually doing this myself, the novelty easily wears off, but because I reflect on this experience and how much I wanted it, the novelty stays alive a bit longer.

Don’t forget to take time to reflect on some of your own accomplishments, experiences, failures, or anything in the past, whether good or bad, to see how far you’ve come and/or to reignite the novelty that once existed. If you don’t want to light that novelty once more, maybe you should do something outside your comfort zone.