Someone once told me that your vet degree is like raising a child as a single parent. 5 years committing your whole life to something is indeed a massive commitment and not one to be taken lightly. Something that needs nurturing, causes sleepless nights, that grows in to a product you can’t help be proud of.
A lot of people take on this commitment as fresh faced young adults, graduating years later and going straight in to a full time job. Those who have taken a gap year will often attest to the benefits of having taken some time out to ‘see the world’ before their degree, although for some, taking time out does not feel like the right move at the time. Whichever camp you stand in, one thing is for sure, travel makes a person grow.
Your degree is the greatest opportunity and excuse to get on a plane and travel. You need to do EMS, so use that chance to get out of your comfort zone, to see wild and beautiful places, to work with in situations that you have always dreamed of. As a student you are often welcomed in to amazing teams and job roles that most people would never get a chance to do. So use it.
Go to that place you have hungered to visit for years, or that location you know nothing about. Open your eyes to different industries, to other ways of practicing. Yes it needs to be relevant, but that doesn’t mean it needs to be the same as everyone else. Meet people in the world outside of yours, whose Facebook messages will keep your mind from sinking too deep in to the repetitive world of study and whose photographs from far flung countries, stuck to your student bedroom wall, will help you through those long nights of revision.
