Lessons Learned

It has now been over a month since I left Italy. It’s hard to imagine my time in Italy felt so long but my time away from it now is going so quickly. In one more month I’ll be leaving Cyprus, my home away from home, quite possibly for good. One short month after that I’ll be starting college in Boston, living in America for the first time in my life.

It’s taken me this whole month to decide what my big end of Italy post should be. I was going to write a one-month anniversary reflecting on everything I learnt this year but honestly that post would probably take a year in itself to write and read. I’ve learnt so much, seen so much, experienced and loved so much this year. I decided to write not what I learnt most in Italy, but what I learnt most about myself.
This year, amongst many other things, was a test of my independence and my relationships with others. It tested my friendships that were hard to maintain while away from home, tested new friendships formed and sadly lost, and tested romantic relationships. Not just in Italy, but in life I have learnt that all relationships start within oneself.

Recently I read a very good quote: "As you grow older, you'll find the only things you regret are the things you didn't do." If you don’t fight for what you want you won’t get it. If you don’t tell your friend you care about them you will regret it but if you do argue and quarrel and cry you will forget what you were arguing about eventually. This advice applies to all aspects of life, not just relationships. If you don’t travel you will regret not experiencing another culture. If you don’t smile you will regret the sadness you allowed into your heart. And if you don’t love you will regret missing the opportunity. Some things come once in a lifetime, like cooking the perfect soufflé or travelling with friends. Cease the opportunity because it’s better to experience than wonder what you could have learnt.
If someone is important to you let them know. I’ve made many mistakes this year when it comes to relationships with others and I will admit that they were my mistakes and my responsibility, because a friendship cannot fall apart unless you let it. That being said the other person has to accept this attitude as well because one person cannot be entirely responsible for both parts of a relationship. If you both accept your own responsibility instead of blaming each other I believe that even the hardest friendship or relationship can be maintained. Maybe not in the way you had hoped, maybe not even in a way that you want at first. But keeping a friend is better than losing one, no matter how hard it is to keep them.


That is what I learnt this year. Above all I learnt that I will never stop learning, never stop trying and never stop growing.