Becoming Undeniable
This summer as a Global Fellow, I traveled to Cochabamba, Bolivia for a total of 6 weeks, and took an extra week to travel around Peru for an additional week. I had an incredible time — there were many highs, and tons of lows. While I as an individual experienced this journey, I feel as though many greater ideas and thoughts that are beyond myself were shared between myself and the environment around me.
The re-entry process for me has been rather difficult. I left Bolivia, traveled to Peru, and then returned back to Santa Clara for my pre-season cross country season. It was a whirlwind of emotions: incredibly sad to leave the home I found in Bolivia, excited to explore and adventure in Peru, and feelings of homesickness and the desire to return home. The second I set foot in Santa Clara that Saturday night, I was in full organization mode as I moved into a new off-campus house by myself, ran 14 miles with my team the following morning, and tried to catch up on the sleep I missed during the past 7 weeks. Welcome back to America!!!!!
While easing myself back into this way of life was physically demanding, my struggles have occurred more from a mental standpoint. The first two weeks after the trip, I was running myself into the ground (literally) and had a lot on my plate. Once I was more settled, I sat down and realized that I hadn’t discussed my experience much at all. I realized how different my world was in Bolivia — and a lot of that had to do with the thoughts that I was constantly pushed to discover within myself.
In Bolivia, a huge goal of mine was to become undeniable. Not really knowing what that entailed entirely, I only knew that I wanted to submerge myself into every task, adventure, and choice with my whole being. And along the way to accomplishing this, I discovered that there are parts of my being that I was discovering more rapidly and clearly than others because I was in an environment that pushed me to do so. For example, every day riding to work I would sit on the Trufi, the public transportation system, and think about how crazy it was that me as an individual is surrounded by all these incredible, strong-willed Bolivians living in this gorgeous country. I would sit at the dinner table for literally 2.5 extra hours discussing the concept of curiosity. with my boss, Anna. Every day brought on some new, original thought. In Bolivia, I existed in a constant state of duality- a place where I existed and experienced an external world around me but also dwelled in an internal place while intrinsically having an inner dialogue about what it all means. And I fell in love with that.
A large reason why I am struggling to come back to this familiar environment around me is because it lacks this concept of duality. Here, I know who I am connected with, who my relationships are, what my day will look like as soon as I wake up. I am not discovering my internal self nearly as much, and all the activities that seemingly have brought me joy are honestly lacking significance to me. I am still very happy, and am thankful for everything I have, but there are parts of me that don’t exactly light up with fire here in this realm because my perspectives have changed and have caused me to reexamine who I want to be.
Even though that is my experience returning, the experience during this trip was obviously incredible. So much of what I encountered, whether it be social injustices or extremely positive narratives, made me think. It made me realize that we are all the same, no matter our location, social class, well-being, ethnicity, gender, we are all connected because of the human drive within us that gives us some type of purpose.
Much of the social realities I observed oddly confused me. While in Bolivia, (and as I discussed in a blog post) I saw a lot of discrimination towards female workers, and poverty. And while I felt compassion and sympathy for these people, I realized how happy they are due to their metrics of success and happiness being much different. They consider family, integrity, relationships, compassion, etc. to be at the forefront of prosperity. Each person listens, each person looks you in the eye to remind you that they care about what you are about to say next. While money is a necessity in this developing world and it is very helpful for those who need it, the people in this country value the connections they have with other people above all else. They are happy, maybe even happier than people in the United States. Why? Because maybe their victories in life come from the sense of belonging that is felt and cherished throughout this society in Bolivia.
A more tangible idea that has been discovered is my love for writing. The project with the AHA female artisans showed me how much I desire to empower other females through the art of writing. I felt their strength and pride radiating from each of the women that I interviewed.. They love what they do, they do what they love, and they share this love with others, and I was able to showcase that through my unique gift of writing.
Overall, I can genuinely say that this experience allowed me to reach beyond myself and my own thoughts of self-discovery. While I now maybe have to reevaluate who I am and who I want to be because of it, I realize how lucky I am that I can have these thoughts and pursuits as a 21 year old. Thank you Global Fellows for giving me the opportunity to become undeniable!
