I try to live a regret-free-life, with the motto that if anything you did was what you wanted to do most at the time, then you can’t really regret it.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but it’s also kind of a pain in the ass! You could analyze all the different ways you could have handled a situation for the rest of your life and you’d really gain nothing from it.
I do have one regret that I think about now and then. If I ever have children, I’m going to make sure they don’t make the same mistake I did.
I was 17, fresh out of high school and obsessed with the idea of traveling (no surprises there). I wanted to go to South America. I wanted to visit Machu Picchu, I wanted to volunteer in Peru, I wanted to visit coffee bean plantations, I wanted to swim with turtles in Costa Rica. I wanted to explore.
But everyone told me that if I didn’t go to university now, I never would.
Neither of my parents had been to university, and I really saw university as the key to unlocking a world of opportunities. If traveling meant I would never go to university, then I simply couldn’t travel now.
So, I didn’t. I went straight to study, choosing something I had loved at school but was too young to consider whether it was something I really wanted to do for the rest of my life; I studied Molecular Biology and Genetics.
I enjoyed my degree and I learned a lot, but fast-forward to now and I’ve never used my degree since graduating. I could have hunted for a lab job once I finished studying, but I chose to do what had been playing on my mind since I was 17: I went traveling.
People rant about the “school of life” and many parents are choosing to unschool their children, taking them traveling instead of enrolling them in traditional education. If you haven’t thrown yourself deep out of your comfort zone, then you wont be able to grasp how much you learn about yourself and the world from traveling.
Now I’ve spent some time traveling the world and being a global citizen I know that my career path I want for myself is completely different than when I was bright-eyed and fresh out of school. I want to communicate with others, I want to be surrounded by people, not stuck in a lab, and I want to make the world a better place.
I regret not traveling before studying and I regret not doing an exchange while at university.
If you’re reading this and you’re trying to decide whether to study or to travel: I say TRAVEL loud and clear.
If you’re reading this and you’re mid way through studying, but dreaming of foreign lands: do an exchange year!
Doing an exchange is a great way to see more of the world, without putting your academic studies on hold. You get to experience a different culture, a different university and make a bunch of new friends. You can spend your weekends and holidays exploring your new host country… ah! I feel envious just talking about it.
How to do a University Exchange:
The first thing you need to sort out is which universities in which countries you can do an exchange with. This will depend mostly on your university and what agreements they have in place. Talk to your course advisor a year before you’d like to do the exchange so that you can get all the details ironed out.
The great thing about many universities is they have set up agreements so that international students coming through a partner university only pay their local fees – this means that you wont be paying an extra for your semester or year of study.
Once you’ve decided where you want to go and have enrolled, then you’ll need to sort out some of the finer details like choosing cheap flights, finding the perfect student travel insurance and your new accommodation. Often the university will help you find student accommodation, but you can also look into websites such as Couchsurfing to find new friends or potential roommates.
Because your exchange is through your university or college you’ll get a ton of helpful advice from your course advisor, ensuring that you have enough support to get everything prepared in time. Doing a university exchange could well be the highlight of time your time at college – and is definitely worth doing.
Have you got any big regrets related to travel? Did you do an exchange when you were studying at high school or university? I’d love to hear more about your experiences.
