Everyone has their own path to go on, their own journey to take. Everyone has their own unique insecurities to accept and their own mistakes to make.
These days it is easy to compare yourself and your life to others. Especially because social media has taken over our lives. But you never know what someone's journey is all about and no one can judge your own journey because they have not experienced what it is like to be you. Your experiences makes you who you are and no one can take that away from you. We are all just trying to do our best and make the most of our life in this crazy world. No one has the perfect life. Why would you want to be someone else and have their life when you have the power to be who you want to be and have an extraordinary life? Each person has to decide for themselves what they want out of life. No one else can or should do that for you. What I want out of life is to experience as much out of life as possible: do new things, go to new places, and meet new people.
Most people tend to only put up the best parts about their lives on social media, making their lives seem perfect. It can be easy to get caught up in comparing their best to your worst, when you are having a bad day. You never know what someone could be struggling with behind their seemingly perfect life on social media. For me, seeing people travel is what I get jealous of or compare my life to.
I forget to be thankful for all of places I have been to and things I have done. Not a lot of people are lucky enough to get these opportunities and I am so thankful. Sometimes I feel greedy for wanting more, but I can't help it. I have wanderlust. I have gone on trips to London/Paris, Mexico, and Greece/Turkey with my family but they have only lasted 10 days or so. I have even gone on a month long volunteer trip with cheetahs to Africa, where I did amazing things, but It still felt too short. I feel like I might never be satisfied. But maybe being unsatisfied is not so bad, because it gives me the motivation to travel more. I think before I went to Africa, I was afraid of getting home sick or not being ready to be gone longer on my own (without my family or anyone I knew before my trip at least ) but now I realize how passionate I am about traveling. I will do anything to make it happen. Going to Africa for a month, made me wish I was able to study abroad for a semester, but that never really worked out with the ups and downs of my college career.
I think sometimes people don't realize they do have the resources to be able to travel. What they need or lack is the passion and dedication it takes to make it happen. Seeing Facebook friends who are the same age as me, live out the dreams I have of long-term traveling, made me believe that I could do it too. But other times I do get overwhelmed by how many places I want to go and things I want to do. I get overwhelmed by realizing how much money I need to save, how much time it will take, and the amount of planning I will have to do. I also get overwhelmed by how many places other people I see on Facebook have traveled to. I think about how I want to go to that many places and be able to travel that long but I feel like I can't catch up or I do not know how to make it happen. But it's not a competition. Life is not a competition. Instead, I should use their experiences as motivation to create my own experiences. I should ask questions to see how they are able to travel so much. Instead of getting jealous of their opportunities and techniques, I want to use the opportunities they used, as advice to find my own opportunities and techniques.
I have to realize I'm young and still have time. Studying abroad was not my only opportunity to long-term travel. I have to just take things one step at a time. Each person goes through different seasons of their lives at different times. Maybe the best things come to you when you least expect it. There is no one right way to get to where you want to go. Doors will open if you continue to put effort in what you are most passionate about. For me that involves saving money, researching, and planing to travel. For others, that could be finding the right person, or the best career. I think the important thing to realize is to not to compare your life to others. You may think that they have something that you want, but you may have something that they desire. There is no point on dwelling on comparisons, because all you have control over is your own life. The best thing to do is have confidence in yourself, to be able to be all the things you want to be, do all the things you set your mind to, and go to all the places you desire. All you need to be who you want to be and have an extraordinary life is passion, dedication, and determination.
Here is some of the best advice I have gotten from quotes about this topic:
"What you have no one else has so there will be a place for you.
Don't think that because someone got something that you're not going to
get something else. There's room for everybody.""There is always a space for you because there is no one that's exactly like you."I never, ever blow out someone else's candle to make mine brighter."- Chelsea Handler
"Do what you can, with what you have, where you are."- Theodore Roosevelt
"Somehow, we'll find it. The balance between whom we wish to be and whom
we need to be. But for now, we simply have to be satisfied with who we
are. " Unknown
"I am learning everyday to allow the space between where I am and where I want to be, to inspire me and not terrify me.” ― Tracee Ellis Ross
"Yeah there is a lot to see and do and it is daunting. But it is also exciting. And even if we don't see it all, there is something immensely comforting in the idea that there are spectacular parts of our world that exist, even if we never see the. There are northern light hover in the sky right now , somewhere in the world.A long with a mountain gorilla carrying an infant and a market buzzing in the early moring in Japan, and a heard of wild horses walking in the sand dunes of Namibia. It's out there and I think that is pretty amazing. In and of itself. You are young. You got it. Don't be discouraged. Be inspired. You are going to live a full, beautiful life"- Tate Drucker
