by Hunter Hales
Embracing ambiguity gave me the best summer of my life. If you’re reading this, as a college student, you probably understand the stress of spring semester. In the midst of midterm prep, a quickly declining bank account courtesy of Starbucks, and getting a solid 4 hours of sleep each night, you’re also expected to have an incredible *paid* internship lined up for the summer. As a liberal arts student, you’d understand the struggle of getting a paid (or unpaid) internship in your field of study. Sometimes you have to let go of the rigid 5-year plan that you’ve rehearsed since high school and take a chance on the unknown. My story is probably not one that most college students can directly relate to, but it’s an example of embracing the ambiguity, being confident in yourself, and thanking your grandparents for the generous birthday money you’re about to use for a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
“Respond to every call that excites your spirit.”
-Rumi
In the spring of 2018, a family friend put me in touch with a contact of hers in Argentina who works with Puentes Abroad – an internship provider for college students in Buenos Aires. With no other plan in sight, I scheduled a 15-minute phone interview and suddenly found myself filling out scholarship applications and internship questionnaires. A week later, I was matched with two sites: a non-profit focused on international learning for individuals with Autism, and Eco House, an up-and-coming environmental NGO. Both sites were foreign to me – my major had virtually zero correlation to either of them, and preparing for the interviews made me feel like I was trying too hard to fit into a field I knew nothing about. I was still searching for a sign that would put my mind at ease and affirm that this experience would be a good decision.
The day after my interviews, I saw the first sign: a scholarship acceptance letter, courtesy of Puentes Abroad. Feeling a weight lifted off my shoulders, I dug deeper and found that the work Eco House was doing in Buenos Aires was impressive. Maximo Mazzocco, the founder, was one of the pioneering individuals fighting for environmental education and awareness in Buenos Aires, and I would have the chance to join that movement. Paola, my soon-to-be supervisor, raved about the diverse and inclusive atmosphere of Eco House and assured me that my work would have an immediate and direct impact on the community. Suddenly, all the doubts went away. Even though I would be working in an unfamiliar field, my ambition to make a difference and have a sustainable influence on the world transcended all the what-ifs.
The hardest part of the planning process was explaining to my parents why I was paying to intern abroad, at Eco House (an environmental NGO,) as an International Studies and French major. Not completely sure myself, all I could say was that I would develop valuable transferable skills, learn how to adapt to life abroad, put my Spanish to good use, and come back with an incredible travel story.
My first day consisted of reading through 2 pages of paperwork, then getting sick and having my supervisor call me a taxi home. After a few teary phone calls to my parents, I decided to give Argentina a second chance and decided to make the most of it. I eventually looked forward to going to work, sitting outside with friends, listening to music, researching about cigarette butt pollution, playing with pups, building recycling containers, learning how to prepare maté… the point is, it was incredible and never once did it feel like a boring internship. I made the most incredible friends, took an 8-hour bus ride to go paragliding on my week off, explored Buenos Aires, and attended some amazing, thought-provoking workshops courtesy of the Puentes Abroad team! Those 8 weeks in Argentina were the highlight of my college experience, and I couldn’t wait to get back home and talk about it.
After having a transformational summer, I still found myself struggling to convey the experience as something that would propel my educational and professional career. It wasn’t something directly related to my major and it probably looked like more of a vacation than a serious professional experience. It wasn’t until I got involved with the Beyond120 Program at the University of Florida that I learned how to get people engaged with what I had to say. We took a week-long trip to Washington, D.C. and somewhere between the alumni visits and networking receptions, I discovered how to appropriately convey my Buenos Aires experience. Coming back to campus, enrolling in Professor Grubbs’ Strategic Self-Marketing course further enhanced my ability to talk about my experiential learning opportunities, and now as a Beyond120 Intern, I have a larger platform to share with other students how embracing ambiguity can be a good thing.
As a liberal arts major, it can be difficult to find a clear path to follow post-graduation. In my opinion, the beauty of the liberal arts lies in its limitless opportunities and diverse avenues for professional engagement. The hardest part is being openly curious and embracing the unknown, because you never know what’s behind an unopened door.
