Reflection is the art of consciousness. Descartes thought, therefore he was. I think, therefore I am. Of what value is an experience if it is never to be reflected upon? As a college student, I often pose this question to many of my peers, regarding the topic of untamed debauchery specifically. It’s typically a very poorly received question.
Anyway, on the topic of reflection and Costa Rica – because that’s where I’d been for fourteen days – here’s something I wrote a couple months ago at the end of the trip:
After almost two weeks, we find ourselves nearing the oft-ignored back cover – we’re soon to return from the moth-ball scented wardrobe, climb up from the rabbit hole, step back through the partition between platforms 9 and 10. Soon, we will stand disoriented amidst the hustle and bustle of King’s Cross, not quite prepared for an end to this surreal odyssey. The conclusion of a journey is at times the most important moment throughout. Only at this point can we reflect on what’s been done, achieved, learned. Only now, with a backward glance, can we acknowledge and appreciate the widening aperture between who we had been and who we are today. It is the moment of resolve that reveals the gravity of an experience, and so I say with a meditative breath that I am grateful to have arrived at this end.
On the one hand, I sometimes fancy myself a good writer, and so I’m just showing off. Of course you all can be the real judges of the quality of my magniloquence. More importantly, I think this piece does a very good job expressing all the thoughts and sentiment I really possessed at the time, much more so than if I had tried to find new words two months later. The purpose of my writing this was to undergo a reflective exercise, the doing of which assigns tangible value to the experience had. As a piece of advice to others who might venture abroad one day, I encourage you to engage yourself in this way once you near the end of whatever journey.
I had no enlightening revelations regarding my ‘plan of study’ throughout this program, but I did learn something valuable about myself. When I was much younger, I used to be a very outgoing child. Constantly the center of attention, everybody’s friend- a real party animal. As I aged, I eventually came to acknowledge the incredible weight of the expectations had by others on the behavior of a young adult. This acknowledgement happened several years too late. By the time I realized how immature I had been, I was already well into high school. It was during the Pandemic. Sitting in my room with nothing to do but think, I eventually managed to mold my character as one molds clay into something new. My new self was reserved, tense, and constantly paranoid. I’ve been this way for a couple years now, and I’ve been aware of it.
During my trip in Costa Rica, we spent a day on a mini cruise ship sailing out to an island off the coast to enjoy the beach. I hated it. There was lots of noise, people, light, more noise, heat, more people, thirst, more noise. There was too much stimulation. I couldn’t bear it. But I thought to myself that the younger me would have been right in his element, probably causing all of that stimulation for others.
A part of me has deeply regretted that I canned my old self. I still do. Except in this moment on the cruise ship, and later on the beach, I realized that I could become that person again. I know how to be him. I know how to be excited and boisterous and energetic. It’s all natural for me. I could feel, somewhere in my chest, that there is a lever. I currently have the level flipped to ‘off,’ but I know, if I really wanted to, I could flip it back ‘on’ again. Perhaps one day, in certain situations, I’ll decide to do so.
That is what I discovered from this experience.