5 Reasons to Try Volunteering Abroad

Buon giorno, everyone! We are on our way to Italy today, the first official travel day of our #10for10trip. If you’re interested in following our Global Neighbor Project – stories from your neighbors across the world, we just opened the sign ups for Global Neighbor Ambassadors. Ambassadors will get two e-mail updates per month – share the stories that resonate with you and get exclusive opportunities to take part in our journey! 

In the meantime, we hope you enjoy this guest blog post by Athena of Housing Anywhere. Intentional Travelers is not affiliated Housing Anywhere and this guest post is not an endorsement.

Volunteering is often overlooked and yet it could bring you much more than you think. Travel, great encounters, new skills … Here are some good reasons as to why you should experience volunteering.

Discover the World

Volunteering can be a low-cost way to experience a new place. Wherever you go, being a volunteer means getting out of your comfort zone. This allows you to discover another world, to open yourself to other possibilities while giving your time and effort for a cause that is dear to you.

Share your Knowledge

Volunteers who have expertise in a particular area can help pass along their knowledge in both formal ways – like a volunteer job – or informal ways – in casual conversations with the people you meet. Always make sure you approach the community you’re entering with respect and humility. Read more about “when helping hurts” here.

If you are particularly gifted in a subject and you have mastered the art of communication, consider teaching. This will also give you he opportunity to expand your knowledge and discover how passionate you are about a particular subject matter – possibly beneficial for you to discover what you really want to do in your own further education.

Meet new People

Apart from school, a bar or the gym, it can be difficult to meet new people and sometimes you want to meet people who are different from your usual circle – to hear other opinions and insights in order to change your own perception of things. Volunteering is an excellent way to do this. You will meet people who are going through the same soul searching experience as you are and are open to new conversations. You will have a true experience of exploring the different perspectives of the world.

Learn to Work as Team

Volunteering can help you improve teamwork skills, as most volunteer roles require interacting with mutliple groups of people. Sharing and communication between different members can help you to understand the stakes and constraints of a task carried out by several people.

Gain Confidence

Whether it is for ecology, education or simply helping the ones who need you the most, volunteering gives you a sense of usefulness. If you lack self-confidence, volunteering will also boost your self-esteem when you learn new skills and accomplish new things. Group work, organization, communication, crisis management … These are capacities that can be acquired during your volunteer work and can be very useful as you pursue other things in the future.

Overall, volunteering is an amazing experience because of its benefits for the world but also for yourself. It might help you find out who you are and for which purpose you have been put on the planet. As you travel the world to serve, consider finding your accommodation on HousingAnywhere.com an international platform for accommodation with maximum security.

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