My 2018

When I started this blog the goal was to document my coming of age experience. I remember distinctly that I was having a coffee with my mentor and I was discussing my anxiousness about going on exchange and not having the ability to ‘work on something’ for those 6 months of my life. I remember he replied saying “Sachin first of all you’re 19, relax and second of all document all your thoughts and experiences because I think they can add value to a lot of people’s lives”.

Today I sat down at a cafe to evaluate my 2018 goals/learnings and plan for the next year and I thought fuck it, why not share this with the world.

Every year get’s better and better and 2018 was no exception. The year started of in East Africa where I had the opportunity to spend a lot of quality time with family as well as to agree-to-disagree with my grandma about the generational differences in our views. All of our ideologies and personalities in general are a result of the environment and context we have been exposed to and I’ve finally begun to properly grasp this concept.

I remember this one moment on a Safari in Masai Mara where I looked at a Lion from our van and this cheesy quote that I saw somewhere popped into my head, “Lion’s don’t lose sleep over the opinion of sheep”. In that moment I decided that 2018 would be the year that I didn’t alter my values or opinions for anyone. I’ve always been a pretty open person but this year I haven’t left any part of my personality unexposed when first interacting with people. This has led to the development of some of the best relationships I’ve ever had.

My short time in Sydney this year held a lot of learnings and experiences. I begun working at a startup, where my boss became one of my greatest mentors. Friendships changed and manifested themselves in different forms and I started to pay close attention to the people I surrounded myself with. Startup ideas were flying around everywhere and unfortunately I failed on my goal to launch a social enterprise in the first few months of the year. I also made some changes in my personal life, coming out of a long relationship and learning not to be so dependant on the people around me. Meditation, reading and getting coffee’s with people I could learn from were the big standout habits I managed to develop in the first half of the year.

In July this year I overcame the intense sadness about leaving my brother behind, to board a plane to the other side of the world. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts I’m someone that was incredibly reliant on my mother and I now I can say I’ve learnt about 10% of what being a functioning adult entails. Travelling by myself was by far one of the best experiences I’ve had but I’ve already written about that here. My backpacking journey came to an end with life-long friendships, an increased sense of self and countless memories.

My exchange journey started moving in with a guy I didn’t know that well. Since then we have created 100’s of memories together, become best friends and basically merged into the same person. I’ll save the rest of the romance for our wedding day however I will tell you a little bit about what it’s like to live in our house-hold.

1. It’s messy as fuck
2. We will constantly be debating or researching a new idea. Whether this is Artificial Intelligence or Simulation Theory.
3. We talk a lot of shit. Our conversation transition from philosophy to non-sensical bullshit.
4. There’s people over almost every night (this is what happens when you put two very extroverted boys together).

Aside from all the travelling, parties and adventures I think one of the biggest things you get from exchange is the development of your inter-personal skills. Living life in a foreign country is daunting at first but there is a very universal part about the human experience; a smile and the right body language can smash any cultural barriers. On exchange I realised what makes me tick. Getting up in the morning meditating and doing gratitude, going to the gym, the outdoors, learning, interacting with people and working on something bigger than myself are all things that give me energy. For me exchange presented a huge conflict in my mind between spending time researching/learning and going crazy like a stereotypical college kid. I think I managed both but this definitely reflects a larger theme in my life.

13 countries, a lifetime of memories and a brother for life. Although I didn’t achieve every goal I set out to achieve this year it couldn’t have been any better. For 2019 I look forward to more learning and surrounding myself back with people I love. There’s no doubt I’m going to miss the freedom of living overseas however I’m keen to take this different version of myself for a test drive in Sydney. I’m going to work on being less sporadic with my interests and trying to work hard on a few particular things which truely align to my values in the coming year.