The Waiting Game
In a mere few weeks, my life will be turned upside down. I will be living in a place that I have never been to, surrounded by people I have never met who will be speaking a language foreign to my vocabulary. In anticipation of my departure to Spain, countless thoughts are running through my mind. What will life in Spain be like? Will I easily adapt to the culture? What will be expected of me in my job placement? All of these thoughts are fuelling a multitude of feelings. Excitement, nervousness, anticipation. I cannot predict what is going to happen, I cannot predict how I'm going to feel once I embark on this journey, or how well I will adapt to the changes and challenges coming my way. All I know is that when one steps outside of their comfort zone..great things can happen and valuable lessons can be learned.
So now I’m in a position where I’ve quit my full-time job of three years, I’m packing to move out of my house, and I’m preparing to jump on a plane to live on the other side of the world for the next three months. All with only 4 weeks notice. So many changes, so suddenly, yet instead of feeling overwhelmed or stressed..I feel a formidable sense of calm and composure. I feel that I am heading to exactly where I am meant to be at this point in time, in order to positively influence the direction of my future both professionally and personally. Strangely enough, it’s a feeling I have been actively seeking for years, but looking in all the wrong places. When I applied for this internship position, I must have finally come to a point where I knew I needed to let go of all that is familiar, and open myself up to being thrown outside of my comfort zone and daily routines in order to achieve a sense of fulfilment. And this is one of the key things that motivated me to apply for this internship.
In terms of expectations of what I’d like to get out of this experience, they are quite broad at this point in time. I have not yet been presented with specific details outlining my role and what is expected of me, or what projects I will be focusing on. What I do expect is that I will enhance and broaden my current knowledge on both a professional and personal level by working with new people, on new projects. I will have Kirsten as my workplace mentor and Andrea as my fellow intern - both of whom I’m sure I will learn a great deal from. I will also be working with other new people whom I hope will guide me, yet allow me to contribute to the team and projects at hand. If I can come out of this experience and be able to say to myself “Imagine if I’d never done this and learned what I have learned?..” then I would say this would be a signal that I have met this expectation.
Deepening my thoughts on expectations, I would also like to learn more about my professional strengths and weaknesses, in order to gain an understanding of what parts of my skill set I can leverage going forward into my future career, and what aspects I need to work on in order to move forward into my future career. If I ensure that I am content with the fact that I will not know everything, this will be a key aspect for me in being able to grow professionally. It will be crucial for me to not become overly frustrated with, or critical of myself if I don’t know how to approach or solve a problem, and to take on board all forms of constructive criticism or suggestions in a positive and open way. I will know if I’ve met this expectation if I can finish the internship feeling that I consistently showed confidence in what I knew, yet the had ability to stand down and be ready to learn when feeling out of my depths. Something else I expect to get out of this experience (which will not immediately be measurable) is new opportunities. I hope that what I learn from this internship abroad will not only provide me with new skills and knowledge, but will open up doors that may not have been available to me had I not put myself out there to do this.
Overall, I would like to finish this placement feeling inspired, motivated and excited about my career going forward. I would hope that my future self will reap the benefits of such an experience and such outcomes, in order to move forward in a direction that will always be in line with my core values and true self - thus allowing me to use my strengths and skills to achieve great things.