A Young Broad Abroad Gives Good Advice

I have the good fortune to have a young, smart, American girl staying in my house. While I love her adventurous spirit and her kindness, it's her smarts that really have me hooked. Her blog "love thy passport" is chronicling her journey as a recent graduate in search of life, love, adventure, and eventually a job. She ended up here in Brussels, on my guest bed and recently posted the following. I find it quite sage for a 22 year old proving that we are never too young, or too old, to gain a new perspective. She writes:

In addition to the renewed invigoration of an entrepreneurial spirit and true personal passions I would like to comment on one benefit financial turmoil has afforded me: perspective. At first glance recent graduates appear at a disadvantage to our predecessors who left college with a plethora of job options. During the Clinton years entry level salaries were quite high. Newbies learned to love the green and ran with it.

Warm and fuzzies associated from the purchases of fancy cars, nice homes, and bling tend to wear off once reality hits. The realities, to name a few, came in the form of high gas prices, mortgage meltdown, and DIVORCE....of course she left your ass, you were always working!

We measly recent graduates, who have to taste a bit of what it is like to work hard, be poor, and get creative in order to achieve our goals, should count ourselves lucky. My alternative route brought me to Brussels where I am picking up some French and teaching English to children. If I had rushed straight into the career world I probably would have missed out on this experience. Golden opportunity time: the world is giving us the perfect excuse to stay young, enjoy youth, and slow down. I am going to take it. Put on your favorite soul record and do what feels right.

I feel blessed that I was not handed a shiny job straight out of college. Now I can properly plan for the future with some real world perspective. Not to mention the fine tuning of my mad karaoke skills. Here's to the good life!

Of course, I am sure she'd love to have a job. The stress of that must way heavily on her. But I admire the spirit and the glass half full perspective with which she views her life. We old broads abroad can learn a lot from a fresh pair of glasses. I may just try out my own 'mad karaoke skills'. Or maybe not!