After my freshman year of college, I went to upstate New York and worked at a summer camp. Camp lasted for around three months total, but I can honestly say they were the quickest three months of my entire life.

I went to this job and this foreign state not knowing one single person. At the beginning of my journey, I could not even have told you the capital of New York. Embarrassing, I know. After completely immersing myself in the great Adirondack Mountains, I came out a completely different person. I think what happened was I found who I truly wanted to be, what I wanted out of my life, and what I want my future to be. The great part about all of this is that I did it by myself. I did not have my parents telling me what I needed to do, nor my best friend telling me that she did not approve of what I wanted, nor a significant other holding me back. I did what I knew I needed to do, and I became so much more than a normal college student just by learning about myself and having a blast while doing it.

I think if I would have done this one year later, it would not have affected me in the same way. America does not put much emphasis on travel. We go to school, we get a job, and we get married. There is no time for ourselves. It is sad that it took me leaving my home state and everybody I knew just to learn that small lesson. Young adults need time to learn about themselves, but we are never granted the time to do that. There is this big, beautiful world that is in the palm of our hands; yet we never take that and run.

We stay in our home states and start from there. We are friends with all of the same people we were friends with in high school. Why do we settle? I noticed myself starting to settle here in Indiana. I started telling people I wanted to live in Indiana and start a family here. Carry on a tradition.

After being away, I realized that is not what I want at all. I do not want tradition, because tradition is boring. I want to be able to go wherever I want, whenever I want. Do I want to move to the other side of the United States? Bring it on! Or do I want to go and study in another country? Why not! Life gives us the ability to do fun, adventurous things; yet we stay planted. It is so important to realize that we are not planted. Even going 12 hours away from my house made me into such a different person. It made me realize that I am not planted in Indiana.

Study abroad. Work in a different state. Take a week-long road trip by yourself. It’s all about experiences and finding out who you truly want to be. Even in just a short three months, I found out more about myself than I ever would have if I had not left. It’s all about the little moments that make you really realize how blessed and special your life is. Make those moments happen every day and you will slowly start to realize how amazing you really are, at home or not.