I was on my way to the airport, bags all packed. I was going home to Pakistan after spending a month in Houston with my uncle and cousins. I was 17 at the time and it was the first time I was going to be travelling alone. I had travelled a ton with my family, but never alone. I always had someone responsible for me, and I could afford to be slightly careless. But this time, I was on my own and responsible for myself. I said good-bye to my family, and started my journey alone.

 

Throughout, I was thinking that something or the other would go wrong; I could miss my connecting flight, I could end up at the wrong terminal, I could just get completely lost. For the next 20 hours or so, I didn’t talk to anyone except the flight attendants, but other than that, the journey wasn’t bad. I had made it home just fine.

 

But there was some significance to this journey. I realized that my parents had trusted me enough to do this, and that I was really growing up. If I can be responsible for myself to travel to another continent, I would be okay, especially since it was the year before I left for college. I was already scared about leaving my family to study abroad. This experience also made me realize that time was going by super quick and I was really growing up. I tend to think a lot about how quick time passes, and how I can easily waste days by being lazy. 

 

That experience really marked the start, and showed me that I had to get used to the idea of travelling alone now on. I would be flying back and forth 6 times a year for the next four years. And now that I am going home to work alongside my family, I’ll be travelling even more. I realized it was a privilege for me to experience this alone. It forced me to grow up and showed me that I won’t always have someone around. I really think being alone made me more independent and resourceful.

 

By now I have experienced missed flights, extreme delays, emergency landings, crazy passengers, and much more. This shaped character and just gave me different experiences that helped me grow. I now really enjoy being alone, it gives me some valuable personal time. Over the years, I have developed a certain mindset where I believe that everything in the end will be alright; that it all works out in the end. This way of thinking really helps me avoid unnecessary stress. Flying alone provided me with a fear that I realized was so needed. My faith helps with this way of thinking. There is always a reason for things happening in the way they do. It was through this experience that I convinced myself that if something bad happens, then that was the way it was meant to happen. There is no avoiding such situations. However, this way of thinking can be both helpful and hurtful. I am still learning that there are specific situations where this mindset comes into play: it is those times where you cannot curb the outcome in any way. So I cannot think that everything will work out in the end in terms of academics, since I am the one solely responsible for the consequential outcomes. But situations such as flying in a plane or traveling alone, all I can do is be cautious and responsible. If I stick to that, I have nothing to fear.