I have had many mixed feelings as of recent and have been going through quite a mental season.
I'm not really sure where to even start or how to express it.
Finding motivation for anything has been quite difficult recently. To be honest, I've been like that my whole life, but especially now as I always see the overwhelming amount of things I have to do in front of me. Pretty much none of it has to do with Peru or my exchange.
I always think about how I have so many things I want to put on this blog, and the amount of time it would take. How I want to make sure I get down every little detail and thinking I could miss something. The same goes for having my own personal journal. A lot happens here, and it takes time to get it all down. But that's just what I want , so I don't forget anything.
I'm taking the SAT here in Lima in less than a month, and yes, I'm quite nervous about it. I haven't started studying yet even though I have gotten around all of the materials in front of me and set time aside so I can sit down and do it. And I never do. I have to do good on this test if I'm going to get into the school I want to go to.
That is one thing that exchange has given me time to think about and explore since the beginning, which is figuring out what I want to do in college and what colleges I want to go to. I'm still not totally set on my plans yet, because there's so much I want to do, but I know.
A lot has changed in my life recently. A lot of things I didn't really expect to. Plans changed. People changed. I changed.
Back when I switched host families for the first time, the plan was that I would come back to live with them. That did not follow through, and I will be with my 2nd/4th host family for the rest of exchange. Both of the families I have are wonderful, it has been mostly difficult because I now live 1-3 hours away from all of my friends depending on the day/time of day with traffic. That has made things difficult. I was also going to go to a post-secondary school, which would make sense as I graduated from secondary school here last year. But, I am back in a different school. I really like it, it's just a totally different experience from what I had before. Everyone is younger than me and it's a small school.
I'm an adaptable person, or else I wouldn't be on exchange of course. But things totally changing can be hard when they COULD be another way. It's taken me a lot of work to get myself out of that mindset. Especially also knowing that my life when I go back to the US will not be the same. I had a great life back in the US, a life I was looking forward to getting back to. But that is also out of the picture. Things have changed there, too. And I've been realizing that and working hard to accept it.
If it were up to me, I probably wouldn't leave Peru so soon. As difficult as adjusting to the unexpected changes here has been, I know it will be much harder when I go back to the US.
But I know everything will be ok. I continue to thrive and live my life to the fullest as always and enjoy the little things that every day brings! It's all about your mind-set.