My life is made up of reminders and to-do-lists. I write down a lot of things for two reasons – so that I don’t forget, and so that I actually do them – the latter being the inspiration for this article seeing as I’ve had this draft and light bulb moment for about a month now.
Being in Senegal taught me a lot of things about myself, one of them being that I procrastinate a lot, probably to the detriment of my dreams and aspirations. But I also learnt that putting into the practice the command in the phrase ‘Just Do It’ can go a long way in providing a different source of inspiration. This is because this year, I realised that although I was truly excited by the prospect of trying new things, my level of procrastination and my fear of change served as hindrances to my achievements. Therefore, in order for me to practice what I preached, I had to always remind myself to ‘Just Do It’ and then see what happens from there.
By adopting that mentality, I was able to enhance my experience, as I can confidently highlight 10 ways in which ‘Just Do It’ made all the difference for me:
I strongly believe that participating in these activities enhanced my experience in one way or the other, because they served to take me out of my comfort zone in a way that allowed me to be accountable for making the most out of my in-country experience, and for this, I am very grateful.
Throughout the year, there were many short-term, long-term and transferrable lessons and skills that I picked up, but I believe that ‘Just Do It’ will be one of, it not THE most valuable lesson that I will continue to apply in the pursuit of my dreams, seeing as I have realised that I will never know the benefits or disadvantages in doing something new/different until I try.
