There is always hope.

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There is a saying which goes,

'Everything happens for a reason.'

There is also the saying that we make our own destiny.

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How much we invest in these two schools of thought depend entirely on state of mind. This has come to slowly reveal itself through my journey over the past few years.

How much of what has happened to me was my own making? Did I shape my destiny or did it shape me?

Who knows. And I can really say that by now, because if I don't know such a thing about myself, noone else in the galaxy could possibly know for me.

All I know so far is that I've persued my dreams.

This might seem rather great, really, but it's rather the tip to the iceburg.

There is a reason I call them dreams, and a persuit, rather than a plan, and executing it. Because in all these moments I've comprised into these last few years of life, I've never looked far forward into the next one. Dreams are abstract and sometimes inexplicable to those who dream them. It is so for me.

I knew I wanted to study and learn, but I didn't know where this would take me.

I wondered what the hell I was doing on a 23 hour flight all on my own just to achieve this.

I found many new things in my destination, seeing as I left so much of myself behind. Thankfully, persuing what I love to learn about turned out to be extremely fulfilling, and got me through many hardships I encountered along the way. I thought, it's okay, because I'm here, and I'm doing it so that I can do what I want.

But, as I said, dreams simply aren't that simple.

I felt like I had been plucked from my pod. I was removed entirely from my previous life.

I can absolutely call it that now. I have changed, and there's no turning back time. I know that. My family know that. When I visit home, they talk about how different I am. That was an especially hard lesson- while change can be arduous, it is inevitable, for good or for bad.

Having been plucked from my pod, I like a lizard shed a layer of myself which had become so familiar and intrinsically a part of me, leaving it an inert shell and myself feeling . I was left with only myself and 20kg of stuff I shoved into a single black case.

I came into a new culture with new people and new grass and new smells. I brought with me new hopes and new fears.

This may seem like direction, but let me tell you something. We are all going in one single, inescapable direction- forwards. And as fast and far as I was going, I still felt lost every step of the way. I may have comforted myself at times that I was at least going somewhere- but then I remembered I'm not sure where, and it all seemed a bit helpless.

For a long time I wondered if the skin I'd shed was the bit I needed, and I'd lost a part of myself rather than grown out of it. But later, and even now, I'm discovering that I needed to shed everything down to my core. Even my hobbies, my tastes, my habits.

Without them all, I could try new things, find new loves and hates. I could also let my heart tell me what I really loved and needed in my life.

There is a saying that one doesn't know what they have until it's gone.

There is comfort in habit. Leaving home behind really was like losing everything, even though it was all where I'd left it. It was there, but thousands of miles away.

I missed talking with my family at the dinner table, hot tea in my hands and tiles below my feet. I missed all their unique laughs. Leaving my family made me realise just how much I truly love them, and how they love me and would show it in the things they did for me.

My body pined for horseriding. I always loved working at my local stables, and though I knew it made me happy and calm, I never knew I could miss something so much- to the point that I dream so vividly my body feels the motions of the cantering horse and I merge with the familiar feeling, only to wake and find I hadn't moved at all.

My body changed. I lost weight, I grew, none of my clothes sat correctly anymore. My taste changed. My ideas changed. My life changed.

Slowly my priorities in life began to fall into place. The things I miss now I know are going to be a big part of my future. The things I loved then but didn't carry on into the present will be a pleasant part of my memories.

The one thing I know remains: we will all keep moving forward with our journeys, whether we know where we are going or not.