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| Chamrousse, Grenoble |
After talking about the hardships that I've had in the past few weeks while being abroad, I want to try and and make this entry a happier one or at least on a more uplifting topic. I want to talk about 'healing'. Some choices that I made to help myself get out of the ditch that I was in. First thing, 'music'. I don't know about you, but for me music is a giant healer. Whether it's an uplifting song or a sad-ish song that seems to correlate with the mood that I'm in at that moment, music, to me, is a healthy way to let me think or release and reassure myself that what I'm feeling, my emotions, are okay, it is not a bad thing to feel. Second thing, 'exercising'. Running is my thing. I enjoy blasting my music and
taking time out of my day just for myself; a chance to release in a safe manner or fashion. However, it doesn't have to be running. Simply taking walks, sitting in a café, daydreaming outside, can provide the time needed to reflect and get over yourself. Lastly, 'friendship' or 'people'. As much as I like to work things out myself, confiding in someone definitely works a lot faster. It's not even that I have to talk about the situation, but grabbing coffee or food and enjoying the company of others can make you feel happy or happier.
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| Chamrousse, Grenoble |
While it may possibly be the warm Spring weather that's helping, becoming content with yourself is a feeling unlike another. It's a very warm and whole feeling in my opinion. It's very comfortable. In my case it goes hand-in-hand with the things that I want to design. To me, being comfortable enough to portray the emotions of what I'm feeling and partnering that with with a song and then putting that all together in a stage design that consumes the audience.
AND CATHARSIS IS EVERYWHERE....!
*sigh....yes this is what I dream of.
Anyway, without getting too too deep into things, I just wanted to share this because everyone deserves to be happy and everyone deserves to know how special they are.
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| Grenoble,France |
So I'm at the halfway point of my travel abroad experience and it HAS been a great experience. So many new things all at once; the differences between the American culture and the French culture, and all of the amazing people have been able to meet. What an adventure.
While there are a bunch of fabulous things that happen when studying abroad, the reality of the situation is that not everything is going to go perfectly each day. I understand that sounds like a very obvious statement, however it becomes different when you're actually put into the position. But the point of this article today is not to complain about all of the troubles and hardships that I have had in the past few weeks, but to state the conclusions that have developed from those hard times.
For these past two weeks everything seemed to be getting harder instead of easier. I would fail, pick myself back up, fail even harder after that, and then sort of pick my self back up. Then the next day, get punched down three times harder than the day before, and then have barely any energy to continue through the rest of the day with a smile on my face. I was in a hole. A hole that was pretty deep and while back at home I always had people around me that I could hit up and ask to speak to, here I don't have close friends who I feel comfortable enough to open up to and I'm not the type of person to exactly tell my parents that I'm having a hard time abroad....because they're worried enough as it is that I'm not in the country....
So I really didn't know what to do and I was crashing. Luckily, I recently had a discussion over some breakfast and coffee with a friend who is also studying abroad at the same university, but with a different group. I explained to him how I was feeling and basically his advice helped me a lot. It didn't give me this universal right answer, but it gave me what I needed, encouragement.
The fact of the matter is that things are never easy and most likely things are going to get harder, not easier. And some times the case is going to be that you're already going to be down and broken and then something/someone else is going to come along and knock you down lower than you thought you could ever be. What do you do?
You get back up and limp away with what you have left.
For me this means, doing things. I realized that I haven't been doing anything like I would do back home. I wasn't drawing, not as organized as I was before. But somehow I'm turning my energy to those things that I like doing. I guess it's like a form of therapy....I don't really know, but yeah. While I'm not 100% healed, I'm choosing to not stay down, but do something about what I'm feeling because that's what I know. To put what I'm feeling into the things that I do. My passion.
