If you can Survive Sorority Recruitment, you can Backpack Europe

This was one of the blog posts I was most excited to write once I decided to write a blog during my travels. I just saw so many similarities between recruitment and backpacking, it was wild. Last calendar year I was my sorority chapter's Recruitment and Marketing Vice President. This meant I attended and led tons of meetings each week on top of school work, worked closely with our Formal Recruitment Chair and President (now two of my close friends!), and co-led our chapter of 150 women in workshops and a week long formal recruitment filled with numerous challenges. Though this does not seem super similar to backpacking on the surface, both incorporated so many of the same skills and challenges.

Sleep: I got close to zero sleep during recruitment. Every day was 100% dedicated to planning and executing that sleep became a distant dream. Most nights I got a maximum of 3 hours of sleep. Now to backpacking. The first night we landed in Europe I got 1 hour of sleep on the plane and then hopped off in Dublin and went straight into a walking tour and then a pub crawl later that night not getting home until 2am. It was like recruitment all over again. Functioning on no sleep but knowing "hey I signed up for this so I'm putting my all into it." Early mornings were a given in both scenarios as was accepting that you would be getting minimal sleep and having to function as a cheerful human being the next day.

Anywhere can be a bed if you believe in yourself

Eating: This is probably one of the weirdest sensations but when you're so busy, sleep-deprived, and exhausted you just forget to eat. People were constantly asking me when I'd eaten last during recruitment and I was so consumed with making sure everything was going smoothly that I would just forget. Then of course I was made to sit down and eat (thank you sisters) and food felt like more of a fuel than a leisurely thing. Similar to backpacking. I never really forgot to eat, but food really was more of a fuel source than a leisurely thing. I'm not a fun person to be around when I'm extremely hungry, so when we had the opportunity to eat, we had to really EAT, because who knew when we'd get food next.

Energy: In order to get the most out of both experiences you just have to muster up the energy to keep moving and keep smiling. Yes, it's hard in both scenarios, but no one gets very far in life by staying in one place or living with a pessimistic lens. Recruitment taught me so much about creating energy and was a very valuable skill for backpacking.

Finding the energy to get to the airport by 6am

Courage: This is a big one. Somehow when I was a Junior in college I found the courage to interview with our chapter advisors for the position of RVP. If you know me well you know I am not one to love attention. I'm way more of a sidelines person. However, something in me knew that I needed this and that deep down I knew I had the potential so I took a leap of faith and interviewed, and was slated for the absolute best leadership position I could have imagined. If I didn't take this chance I never would have met some of my best friends and I never would have seem my potential. This goes hand in hand with backpacking. Seeing myself take on this crazy leadership role helped me grow so much and helped me realize that you're capable of anything you put your mind to. Going across the world takes a lot out of you and is such a foreign experience that you really have to embrace it and push away fear.

Friends I never would have met without a little chance taking

Living: Since I was on Exec for my sorority, I was required to live in the chapter house my senior year. This meant living among 26 of my sisters in a small area and essentially living in a dorm again. Very much like a hostel! You're in a room with strangers (sometimes 14 other strangers) and you find a way to make it work! Shared bathrooms are no big deal (gotta love shower shoes) and knowing how to navigate to your bed when the room is dark and others are sleeping is a very underrated skill.

Our hostel in Barcelona, Spain

Shoes: Shoes hurt! For recruitment it was 5" wedges and having the stamina to run, jump, and dance around in them for 12 hours each day with a smile on your face. For backpacking, it was only having 3 pairs of shoes and none of them comfortable enough when on your feet for 12 hours. Both involved countless blisters, scrapes, and pain, but hey, that's just a part of the experience!

Dancing and chanting in heels 10+ times a day, everyday.

Conversing: Recruitment is all about conversations! Quick meaningful ones at that too. Backpacking isn't much different! You're meeting so many new people in hostels, on pub crawls, tapas tours, and just around town and being able to strike up a conversation with a stranger is such an amazing skill. It gets a lot less scary too once you force yourself to introduce yourself (you have more in common with strangers than you think most of the time!) If you can survive recruitment and speaking to dozens of new girls in a week span, you can definitely make your way in a new country meeting people!

Patience: Many things went wrong during recruitment and during backpacking, but that doesn't mean you give up! Patience with people and events is so important. I wouldn't have such fond memories of both experiences if I'd lost control and gotten annoyed too quickly. It's all about learning how different each of us are, but learning to adapt and meet people where they're at.

See? Look how similar backpacking is to being in a sorority and co-leading or going through recruitment! You learn so much about who you are and how to carry yourself when you experience recruitment week and backpacking isn't much different. These two events were two of the biggest growing experiences of my life and I hope if you're reading this and you too are in a sorority, that you know deep down that you have the ability to do anything you set your mind to. Especially backpacking!