Finding purpose while abroad

Your teens and twenties are a particularly existential time. How many of the conversations that you have at college revolve around what you’re doing with your life? (Most of them.) How often will you doubt your major, wonder if you’ll ever get a paying job or ask yourself if you’re doing enough, or too much? (Every day.) For the first couple of months I was in Ghana, those questions were stifled. Lately, however, they've returned, and made me think more about finding purpose while abroad.

Before studying abroad, we're usually advised to lay out our goals for the semester or year: What can I get out of this experience? What do I want to learn about myself/my peers/the culture/the world? For many, though, time abroad turns into vacation time. Students who go to Europe are especially prone to this (I’m studying in Germany next semester, so I’m allowed to say that). Sure, you go to classes and speak the language and meet some people, but chances are you’re still going out every night, spending way too much money on food, traveling every chance you get and generally acting in ways that you wouldn’t at your home university.

Maybe studying abroad is an inherently selfish activity. I came to Ghana in the hopes that experiencing another culture would make me a better human rights activist (and a better human). That could be viewed as somewhat selfless, but in the end, it's about me. I come here and drop in for a few months, sympathize with people’s struggles, make friends, absorb experiences -- and then I pack up and go, zipping back to a comfortable home where I'm not required to think about what I saw.

In some ways, Tufts does a better job of preparing us than other programs. The study abroad office and our program advisor emphasize immersing ourselves as authentically as possible. I’ve met a lot of wonderful international students here, and I love hanging out with the other Tufts students, but I also need to remember to make an effort to meet Ghanaians (or Nigerians, Zimbabweans, Cameroonians, etc., as the case may be). Still, most of the activities in which I engage myself are the same as those I would undertake in the States, just in slightly different contexts and with slightly different people.

I’ve hit the point in my time in Ghana when a routine has set in. Riding the rickety buses that are the main form of transportation is no longer a big deal; the food has stopped surprising me. It was these realizations that made me begin to reevaluate how I am using my time here. Am I challenging myself enough? On the one hand, I was reluctant to make any changes. Much of my experience has been about self-discovery: I’ve grown in ways that I couldn’t possibly have expected. For example, I started taking anti-anxiety medication right before I came to Ghana, and have been re-learning how to have relationships with people when my irrational boundaries are lowered. That kind of growth is immensely valuable and important -- but is that why I’m here? Is it enough?

So for now, I’m trying to step back and reevaluate my purpose while abroad. I’m taking more time to myself, which I’d let fall to the wayside. I’m critically analyzing how I use my time (and money). I have started volunteering at a children’s education foundation in order to put my energy into something beyond myself. No, my semester in Ghana won’t boost my resume in the ways that a semester at Tufts would. Still, I firmly believe that by December I will have learned and grown more than in my first two years at Tufts combined.