S.

in a good way.

Reading 3 different blogs of my friends around the world has sparked my thinking about what's my inspiration in life.

One friend is married and much in love, living in Poland, waiting for the baby to be born. He works as an entrepreneur in a firm of his dad, making it an inspiring place. He travels around his own country, volunteers with an NGO, writes a blog about wine tasting and plays electric guitar with his brother as a a hobby (has evolved from a beginner's playing that I used to hear! :) Mike

Another friend is a journalist of Australian origin, just moved to Abu-Dhabi from Cairo, was headhunted to be a journalist in a new regional middle-east regional newspaper. Brilliant writer, observer, loves and makes great food, Apple fan, a bit of a geeky internet user, articulates his thoughts so uniquely...Tom.

The third friend is Brazilian, recently returned home from Australia. Joined sustainability team at a bank, is a very inspiring traveller, sustainability/life thinker. Challenges herself with travels, work, marathons. Reads books and watches videos, the kind that makes me feel an uneducated lazy kid :) Inspiration for nearly everyone who know her, highly intelligent and searching for meaning, self-confident, great friend. Gabi.

So I'm reading their updates, and thinking - i'm in a good way jealous. For the sense of direction I don't yet have myself, for talent, for desire to learn, for being in the right place at the right time.

And I'm catching myself on a thought - so cool i have such great friends as these 3 people... And there are more great stories of my friends out there, so many of them being best benchmarks and inspiration.

I'll keep watching and reading and thinking :)

Labels: friends, inspiration, life

Several things are on my mind these days:

1. AIESEC talks with my flatmate inspired me to check out www.myaiesec.net, and of course I couldn't give a miss to AIESEC 60th Anniversary events. So here's what I looked at today, and I think are great ones to share:

www.aiesec.org/60

and a cool 60 Anniversary video, excellent work by everyone who pulled it together!



Brings back again all those great times, and thoughts on how fortunate I am to be a part of AIESEC experience and history, we've done some great stuff :) Ahh, how do I mark the celebration, where do I go, if anywhere? Can we do something cool in Australia?.. I'll think about that more :)

2. And another, probably even more important topic for me now, is thinking about my career path. And a great collection of tools comes from Career Innovation, UK-based company aspiring to "help make work more imspiring". They have career assessment, goal setting, work environment evaluation, career alignment audit tools, which are great self-guiding approach. If you are an AIESEC alumnus, you can access those here

Labels: 60th anniversary, AIESEC, career, career innocation, resources

and so it seems i've been away from my blog for a while...
there have been things happening of course, but never really prioritize the spare time i have, for blogging. Now, Sunday evening, seems like the right time :)

So latest news: 2 weeks ago I went home to Belarus!
The whole trip took 6.5 days (I flew half the world!!!), which means I spend 3 days traveling, and 3.5 days at home (I am convinced now Frankfurt airport has a long way to go in being a convenient place, and Singapore one is quite nice). Got new passport (the old one was expiring in May - yes, I'm turning 25!..), spent time with family and friends, which was so nice, after a year seeing them last time... And it wasn't even too cold, -2 at most, which is very unlike January in Belarus. Of course was with my parents most of the time - they don't change, just get more grey hair... Spent also some time with my brother's wife (he got married in August), with my friends and their 1 year and 3 months-old son, was enjoying so much being again with dear for me people...
And on the other hand, this trip made me also think what i want to do and what i don't, where I want to be and where I don't... Had a strange feeling, lying trying to fall asleep in my old room at home in Svisloch - is that Australian life, with blue sky and Sydney, love and good work, easy and carefree, does it really exist?
Thankfully, it does :)

Came back on Australia Day (which was spent in true blue way, bbq and being outdoors etc); applied for my visa extension - I'm staying in Australia for at least another 6 months, till mid-August. And now I came back from a wonderful weekend away on south coast, Kangaroo Valley - beautiful place to celebrate best 90 days in the relationship :)

I was thinking the other day that my life indeed was quite easy and carefree for the last year - love and work are great, I live in one of greatest places in the world, and in a nice house, no major financial crisis for me, healthy and safe. My days are now going by as work-yoga-spending time with Karan (third biggest share of my day after work and sleep :) -catching up with friends-social events-parties-going places being it a nice bay in Sydney, valley down the coast or a beach-volleyball time.

And now there is the big question - what happens in 6 months?
How do I combine my love life with my travel continents idea, searching for a job/lifestyle that would be my true passion (that some of my friends call random idea and some call great idea), all of this topped up with my nationality requiring visas to go or stay anywhere?..

I feel the need to do something with my life, and at the same time I know that all that living and working abroad - without him, it just won't be as good.

ahh the choices I have to do...
(on the bright side - it's great I'm facing these choices and not how to escape the boredom/survive somewhere!..)

Labels: Belarus, love, thinking, travel