If you know anyone who is studying abroad right now, you can probably see on their Instagram or Facebook about all of the awesome places that they’ve travelled to.

Whether they’re in Europe or Australia, it seems like everyone is living their best lives. It’s surreal to go through Snapchat stories and see one of my friends is visiting the Vatican in Italy, while my other friend is at an Elephant Sanctuary in Vietnam.

This lifestyle is awesome, but it’s not sustainable.

At least for me, it’s not. It’s crazy that every Monday while abroad I’ve asked people “How was Milan?” or “How was Prague?” without a second thought. These are experiences that are once in a lifetime, and I’ve been able to justify all of the expenditures on travel and food by saying it doesn’t get easier from here. Man, is that true.

Thinking about going back to school with all of the extracurriculars, internships, and other commitments makes my head spin. That’s why so many people will reference going abroad as a ‘semester vacation’. Depending on how you look at it, this is true. It’s a vacation when you think about all of the travel, but then sometimes when you’re in class it feels less like a vacation. I actually had to go to class, write a few papers, and take a few tests while abroad. (Thinking about my Danish final right now gives me some low level anxiety if we’re being honest).

So, yes, going abroad is a nice break. It’s a nice way to step away from your university at home and travel with some good friends. Yet, a lot of what you don’t see in all of the travel-instas are what’s hard about going abroad.

I think there are positives and negatives in every situation, but that it just depends on what you focus on. And when it comes to social media, especially while abroad, everyone shows you their highlight reel. Seldom do people want to tell you about the times they felt uncomfortable, confused, or overwhelmed.

Please don’t misunderstand me when I say this - abroad has been one of the best experiences, if not the best experience, of my short life so far. It truly was the time of #realizingthings, but not in the way you’d always think.

I joke with my friends that when I saw the Northern Lights in Iceland, I saw God. That is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. And that’s one type of realization. A realization where you see something that is overwhelmingly beautiful and you have an unbelievable sense of awe and gratitude. Those moments are almost as important as the other ones.

The other moments I’m talking about are the ones you can’t necessarily pinpoint. The moment where you’re really content with treating yourself to brunch because you worked hard the whole week, you’re (maybe) a little hungover, and you want a breakfast platter. The moment where you say you’re going to go exploring on your own because you like spending time on your own. The moment when you enter yet another Danish grocery store and you’re no longer confused about the conversion rate or what the words are saying.

They’re really small, and they might seem insignificant. And in a way, they are individually. It’s not terribly significant that I would be treating myself to brunch and then go on a walk by my lonesome. It’s only significant in context, only if you knew I would never do that a year ago.

If I posted a photo on the ‘gram about these moments, my followers would be like “Jane’s lost it, who cares about that, I want to see more Cliffs of Moher pictures,” which is valid. I understand not every thought, feeling, or experience should be shared on social media, because in a way it makes that personal growth less personal.

To each their own, but there’s something to be said for not posting and still having a good time. It’s made me think that *maybe* my Instagram followers aren’t in dire need of knowing what cool lunch I had.

This is what I believe leads to a skewed perception of abroad. We don’t want to be the person who posts too much, so we only post the really, really, really cool things we do. We show the travels and the good food and the pretty coffee. We don’t show the fact that for dinner this entire week, I’ve had pasta and suspect pasta sauce. We show the trendy, cool, ~plantbased~, fun food.

So what’s so important about that?

Well, reflecting on these four months seems like a surreal experience, because it truly feels like I just started getting comfortable. I know where to study, where to get coffee, how to (slightly) blend in as a non-American, and how to navigate public transport. Trying to write this piece now, it seems impossible to tell you everything I’ve learned.

There are small, insignificant lessons. The lessons I didn’t ‘gram. There are big, important lessons. The lessons I did ‘gram. There are ones that wouldn’t even come to mind. Yet, similar to many experiences, my abroad experience has challenged me to see what’s been given to me, and what I can give back.

What’s been given to me, besides a diminished bank account, is a deeper understanding of myself. Perhaps this wasn’t so much given as it was figured out, because I knew coming into abroad people always said “it’ll change you”, but they never said why or how. They just said it would.

It is my belief that abroad doesn’t change you, but it challenges you. Abroad didn’t make me a new person. I’m still me. I just have a different perspective. I was lucky enough to get exposure to a different culture, introducing notions of success, equality, and happiness that I hadn’t considered yet.

So what can I give you? A little advice. Getting dropped in another country with people you don’t know pushes you to be self-sufficient and self-aware. It gives you the chance to get to know yourself better, if you want to take it. So when people tell you ‘abroad changes you’, don’t take it at face value. You’ll have to be challenged to grow.

The cool trips and Euro-fashion is part of abroad - but it’s not all of abroad. It’s also trying to speak Danish when you really can’t speak Danish, feeling nervous about making your own travel arrangements, and allowing yourself to see life from a new perspective. Get closer to the people you already know, and maybe even get closer to those you don’t. Try and not be so stuck in your ways, because abroad can’t change you unless you meet it halfway.