I didn’t know places affected my wellbeing, productivity, and quality of life this much — until I’d actually lived in Athens, Istanbul, Seoul, Taipei, Hyderabad, Buenos Aires, San Francisco, New York, Dublin, Cork, Kuala Lumpur, and four cities across Russia, and felt like a completely different person in each one.

This is my first paid post, so a quick word on that: the free posts stay — essays, frameworks, the bigger thinking. What’s behind the paywall is the operational layer: full platform breakdowns, real cost numbers, visa realities by passport, and the stuff I’d tell a client. The kind of research that takes 10+ hours and that I’d otherwise charge €176 for in a call. Here it is for only €8/month :)

In this post, we will cover every platform that lets you test-live somewhere for free or almost free, how actually to get accepted with no experience, the cheapest cities to experiment in right now with real cost-of-living numbers, and how to sublet your place while you go. I’ll talk about passport realities by country in 2026, the tools for researching any city like a future resident rather than a tourist, and exactly how to run the experiment and read your results honestly.

Now. Your city is making decisions about your life, and you probably haven’t noticed. Let’s talk about that.

Read more

Before we start: a significant portion of this post is based on Anne-Laure Le Cunff’s book Tiny Experiments: How to Live Freely in a Goal-Obsessed World. She’s a neuroscientist, the founder of Ness Labs, and the person who gave me the clearest intellectual framework for something I’d already experienced but couldn’t articulate.

I’m not going to pretend the frameworks are mine. They’re hers. What I’m adding is my story, my application of them, and the specific way they land when you’re in your early 20s trying to figure out what to do with your life internationally and unconventionally.

If this resonates, read the post and the book :)

Okay. Let’s goooooooo.

the ritual I had

Every few months, I’d open a new Notion page to title it something like “PLAN 2025” or “life directions — FINAL” and spend four hours building it out: color-coded, hyperlinked, and very emotionally invested. I loved making elaborate career paths, timelines, the specific kind of apartment I’d have by a specific age in a specific city.

Then I’d close the tab and not look at it again for three months.

When I finally did, things had shifted enough that the plan needed significant reworking. Especially now, with global politics moving at the speed they are, building an optimistic, globally mobile life plan and then locking yourself into it is a fast way to be blindsided by your own assumptions.

Kill your darlings. Love without attachment to outcomes.

Somewhere along the way, I realized that’s all these plans ever really were just bingo cards. I’d fill them in with so much conviction, and then life would just keep moving. Some squares became irrelevant within weeks of being “set in stone.” I still felt like I had no control, just a very organized way of pretending I did.

I did this for years. The planning felt productive but it obviously wasn’t.

But here’s what I learned from both Le Cunff’s book and my four-month experiment in 2025 I keep mentioning in every post (I’ll stop at some point, I promise): planning in your 20s doesn’t fail because you’re bad at planning. It fails because it’s the wrong tool for this stage of life entirely.

This post is about why. And what to do instead.

the structural problem with plans

A plan is a linear tool. It assumes:

1. You know what you want

2. You know what you’re good at

3. The world will roughly cooperate

4. The version of you making the plan is qualified to make it :0

In your 20s, none of these are reliably true, though, right? Not because something is wrong with you but because you haven’t collected enough data yet!! You are, quite literally, a scientist who hasn’t run any experiments or not enough experiments.

The plan you make at 21 is based on what a 21-year-old has been exposed to, which might be your parents’ careers, your degree, a handful of internships, and the general vibes of people around you. That’s not a representative sample of what’s possible. That’s like knowing a few places in the city and already drawing its map (I changed the metaphor so many times, I hope it is visual enough).

Le Cunff frames it this way in Tiny Experiments: a linear model of success assumes that wherever you want to go right now is where you’ll want to go in a few years. But you change. The world changes. And crucially — you haven’t met most of yourself yet!!!

why we plan anyway

Le Cunff introduces the concept of the maximized brain — the belief that whatever you do, it has to be the biggest, most ambitious version of the goal. You don’t just want to start writing, you need to write a book. You don’t explore a new field, you commit to a five-year career path.

The maximized brain skips the most important step: finding out whether you actually want the thing. LOL.

I spent an entire painful summer making plans that were, in retrospect, just me trying to want what other people seemed to want. I’d look at LinkedIn and see my peers getting cool-sounding positions, those little “excited to announce” posts, and think: okay, so I need to plan toward that. Even though every time I tried, I hit an internal wall. Not a skills wall. A soul wall.

I kept planning instead of listening, because planning feels like doing something about the problem. It isn’t. It’s often a way of postponing the messier, scarier thing: actually trying.

the three stuck mindsets

This is one of the most useful things in the book.

She describes three default modes people fall into when uncertainty feels overwhelming. I’ve been all three at different points, sometimes in the same week.

The cynical mindset — low curiosity, low ambition. You’ve been disappointed enough times that you’ve stopped trying. Doom-scrolling. Making fun of people who are still earnest. Running out the clock. Planning feels pointless because nothing seems worth pursuing anyway.

The escapist mindset — high curiosity, low ambition. You’re interested in everything and do nothing about it. You have seventeen tabs open about moving abroad, learning a language, starting a hobby. You close them, you reopen them. The curiosity is real but there is no action :( This one is sneaky because it feels like openness, but it’s actually avoidance.

The perfectionist mindset — high ambition, low curiosity. Grinding toward a goal you haven’t questioned in years. Productive, impressive on paper, but often miserable. This is the one that produces the most polished Notion plans (sorry…). The goal is driving everything; curiosity has been exiled as inefficient.

All three lead to the same place: a person who is either avoiding life, dreaming about life, or optimizing a version of life they didn’t consciously choose.

The alternative — what Le Cunff calls the experimental mindset — is high curiosity and high ambition, held together. Open to uncertainty. Treating not-knowing as interesting rather than threatening. Designing experiments instead of chasing outcomes.

This one, please!

the cognitive scripts running your decisions

A lot of our “plans” aren’t actually plans. They’re scripts — internalized narratives about what we’re supposed to do. You do not actively choose them.

Le Cunff identifies three:

The sequel script: Your next move has to make narrative sense relative to your previous ones. You studied X, so you pursue X. You worked in Y, so your next job is in Y. This automatically rules out the most interesting left-field options — the ones that don’t “fit the story.”

The crowd pleaser script: You make choices based on what will satisfy the people around you — parents, peers, the imaginary LinkedIn audience. You’re not asking “what do I want?” You’re asking “what will make me look okay?” Very different questions with very different answers.

The epic script: Whatever you do has to be big, impactful, impressive. Anything small or quiet is failure. This one is celebrated a lot — we call it ambition.

The sign that the script is running subconsciously and harmfully is the word should. I should pursue this. I should know what I want by now. I should commit to something.

Le Cunff’s reframe: replace “should” with “might.” What might I want to explore? What might actually feel right? “Should” is the script talking. “Might” is this explorer mindset we are trying to achieve.

the experiment framework

Okay, the actual practical part. This is Le Cunff’s framework from Tiny Experiments, with my notes on how it lands specifically for 20-somethings.

step 1: observe first

Before designing an experiment, you need data. This sounds obvious but almost nobody does it — we’re trained to act, and observation feels like wasted time.

It isn’t. Le Cunff is clear on this: the scientific method starts with observation, not action. For one week, treat your life like an anthropologist treats a field site. What gives you energy? What drains it? Which tasks do you fall into without noticing the time? Which do you avoid until the last possible moment?

You’re not judging. You’re collecting.

step 2: design a PCT (Le Cunff’s term — Purposeful Commitment to Curiosity)

The simplest possible structure:

I will [action] for [duration].

“I will write one Substack post per week for six weeks.” “I will take on two clients in this field for 30 days.” “I will apply to three international programs this month.” “I will teach one class per week for two months.”

Le Cunff is specific about the criteria. A good PCT is:

• Purposeful — something you actually care about

• Actionable — you can start right now, no extra resources needed

• Continuous — a regular action over a defined period

• Trackable — not measurable by complex metrics, just: did I do it today, yes or no

And critically: keep it tiny. The maximized brain wants 100 days. Le Cunff recommends starting with six weeks or less. A small experiment you complete gives you data. An ambitious one you abandon gives you nothing :0

step 3: analyze two different signals

When the experiment ends, look at two categories:

External signals — did it work by objective measures? Traction, income, feedback, opportunities?

Internal signals — how did it actually feel to do? Dread? Aliveness? Did time disappear?

Le Cunff’s example from the book: she ran a YouTube experiment for a full year. External metrics: growing subscribers, positive comments, collaboration requests. Internal reality: she dreaded filming every single week. Was anxious in a bad way. Procrastinated for days before each video.

She stopped because external success that feels horrible from the inside isn’t success.

The goal is overlap: something that works externally and feels right internally. Everything else is data pointing you elsewhere.

Then: persist, pause, or pivot. Keep going, stop, or tweak the parameters and run the next cycle.

my actual experiment

I spent my first post-graduation summer in a Siberian forest. My “normal” path had collapsed: the Europe move, the stable adult life. I spent three months making plans that went nowhere.

Then I stopped planning.

I ran the dumbest, most embarrassing experiment: pursue six completely different things simultaneously, commit to none of them, and pay attention to what still felt mine. I called it “killing my ego by a thousand side quests.”

Read the full story here:

So Le Cunff’s framework gave me language for what I’d already done intuitively. That’s why I think it’s worth reading — not because it tells you something you’ve never heard, but because it names something you’ve probably already half-known, and naming it makes it usable.

Four months of chaos > five years of “what if.”

how to actually start

1. The calendar audit. Open your calendar from the last two weeks. For each thing you did: energy or drain? 20 minutes. This is your observational phase.

2. List your recurring thoughts. The ones you keep having but they don’t “fit the plan”. Not all of them — the recurring ones.

3. Design one PCT. The smallest, most doable version of one of those recurring thoughts. Six weeks or less. Write it out: “I will [action] for [duration].”

4. Take notes as you go. A few bullet points on your phone. Did you do it? How did it feel? That’s the whole tracking system.

5. Analyze at the end. External signal + internal signal. Persist, pause, or pivot.

Repeat until you’ve accumulated enough lived data about yourself to recognize what you actually want when you see it.

one last thing

This isn’t anti-ambition, “don’t have goals,” or “just vibe.” It’s a reordering of operations.

Instead of committing first and learning second (the plan model), you learn first and commit after you have evidence. That order matters SO MUCH. Committing before you have data on whether something fits you is how you end up on a path that looks right from the outside and feels hollow from the inside.

Exploration isn’t a detour from your path. For most people in their 20s, it is the path.

Now tell me: what experiment would you design? :)

Leave a comment

🫂 here’s how we can work together:

I'm a global opportunities strategist — I help multipassionate, globally curious people figure out what to do with their lives internationally: which programs to apply to, how to relocate, which experiments are actually worth running given your passport, budget, and timeline. Basically, I'm the person you talk to when you have too many options and no idea where to start.

• The Guide — a 60-minute strategy call followed by a personalised roadmap delivered within 72h. We map your background, goals, constraints, and every viable path open to you: visa logic, program options, and application strategy. For people who want a real plan, not a list of random ideas.

• The Guide + Walkthrough — everything in The Guide, plus a second call where we go through your roadmap together and lock in your priorities and first steps. For people who don’t just want to receive a strategy — they want to actually understand it.

• Full Support — everything above, plus three months of biweekly calls, accountability, application feedback, and a strategy that updates as things evolve. For people who want a thinking partner throughout the execution process, not just planning.

Hugs,

Daria 🤍🌏

Let me start with a question. When was the last time you did something with no plan to monetize it, post it, or optimize it? Just... did it? Because you were curious and the idea lit something up in you?

If you’re struggling to answer, that’s the whole point of this post.

the algorithm that ate your curiosity

Somewhere along the way, my generation went from "follow your passion" to "monetize your passion." 61% of Gen Z feel societal pressure to monetize their hobbies. The economy is, to use a technical term, cooked.

But when every spark of curiosity gets immediately run through the “can I make money off this?” filter, you stop having sparks.

You stop noticing the weird little voice that goes, oh, I've always wanted to volunteer on a farm in Portugal… I keep looking at that teaching English program and closing the tab… What if I just... applied for the scholarship?… You dismiss it before it even finishes the sentence, because it doesn’t fit the “rational 5-year plan”.

This is the thing I think we’ve gotten catastrophically wrong.

the intrusive thought you keep ignoring

You know the one. You’re bored, or half-asleep, or in the shower, and something comes up. Something specific and kind of embarrassing to admit. I’ve always wanted to try ceramics. I kind of want to just... move somewhere for a year. I wonder what it would feel like to teach kids.

And then your brain, which has been very well-trained by hustle culture, immediately goes: but how? and why? and what’s the ROI on that? And the thought dies.

I’m here to tell you: stop killing those thoughts!!

Not every intrusive curiosity is a calling. But if it keeps coming back — if it’s recurring, if it lights something up inside you even when nothing else is — that’s a signal. And the fact that it doesn’t fit your current plan, or feels too random, or “isn’t the right time” — that’s exactly why you should pay attention to it.

The problem is that we’ve been taught to treat exploration like it’s a detour from the real path. It isn’t. For most people, it IS the path.

what do smart people think about it

To feed my confirmation bias, I started reading a bunch of books on generalists and non-linear paths. Turns out f*cking around is backed by actual data.

David Epstein spent years studying the world’s top performers across fields (athletes, artists, scientists, inventors). He found something that will genuinely upset my LinkedIn feed: generalists often find their path late, and they juggle many interests rather than focusing on one. But they’re also more creative, more agile, and able to make connections their more specialized peers can’t see.

His book Range makes what he calls “a compelling case for actively cultivating inefficiency.” Failing tests is how you learn ;) Frequent quitters end up with the most fulfilling careers. The most impactful people cross domains.

I am not a sports fan, but it was interesting to read how he contrasts Tiger Woods (specialized in golf at age two, a prodigy by design) with Roger Federer (tried every sport as a kid, resisted being fast-tracked, came to tennis late). In short, people built an entire cultural mythology around the Tiger path — the idea that success requires choosing early and grinding hard. But Federer’s path is actually more common among the truly excellent.

There’s also this from Range: a study found that students who were given more time to sample before specializing had better “match quality” between their skills and their careers. The conclusion was that learning stuff was less important than learning about oneself.

“Exploration is not just a whimsical luxury of education; it is a central benefit.” David Epstein

A central benefit. Not a waste of time. Not a distraction. A core feature of becoming who you’re supposed to be!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

but why is gen Z specifically so bad at this

The pressure isn’t new because every generation has had its version of “figure it out faster.” But I do think something qualitatively different is happening to us. Gen Z grew up on “do what you love,” now gets a different deal: “monetize what you love” — or risk falling behind. It’s not the same thing at all.

It’s not just hobbyist pressure. It’s the texture of how we think about time itself. When every hour of your day is potential productive time, rest feels irresponsible.

Experimentation feels like procrastination. A month spent learning something that doesn’t “go anywhere” feels like failure, even when it was the exact input your brain needed to eventually figure out what it actually wants.

The “passion economy” encourages people to monetize every interest — from baking to painting — transforming hobbies into another revenue stream rather than a form of joy. And what we lose in that transaction is the thing that made the interest valuable in the first place: the fact that it was ours, uncurated, unmonetized, and messy.

I’ve seen people kill a genuine love of photography the moment they tried to turn it into a business. I’ve done it myself with things I cared about. When something becomes a product before it becomes a practice, it often stops being either.

my f*cking around

Last year, I spent four months doing six completely different things simultaneously — Russian teaching, freelancing in graphic design, content creation, applying to master’s programs, learning Korean, and yes, interviewing for corporate jobs I instinctively knew I didn’t want (because I needed to ACTUALLY know not just assume). No plan to “win” at any of them. My only goal was clarity.

More about that here:

People thought I was chaotic, and I was hehe :) But that chaos was actually the most productive period of my twenties so far, because it gave me something five years of “just pick one thing” hadn’t: a sense of what actually feels like me.

The answer, by the way, wasn't any of the six things. It was the umbrella that held all of them — and once I saw it, I couldn't unsee it. It took trying everything to find the shape of what I actually wanted.

That’s the explore/exploit tradeoff in action. You can’t skip exploration and go straight to exploitation. You end up exploiting the wrong thing.

your twenties are for collecting puzzle pieces, not finishing the puzzle

Here’s what I want to say to anyone in their early-to-mid twenties who feels behind: love, you’re not behind!! You’re in the part that feels like wandering but is actually reconnaissance*.

*literally just learned that word; but it means “a mission to obtain information by visual observation or other detection methods”

The goal right now is not to find the thing. The goal is to accumulate enough lived data about yourself that when the right thing shows up, you recognize it. You can’t do that from behind a spreadsheet or someone else’s roadmap.

International travel helps. New environments help. Doing things badly without an audience helps enormously. But you also don’t have to leave your city — you just have to start saying yes to the weird recurring thought that keeps showing up and lighting something up in you, even when it makes no logical sense.

Not every thought. The recurring ones. The ones that come back. The ones where your body does something a bit hopeful before your brain shuts it down.

a practical reframe

Instead of protecting yourself from wasted time, consider that what looks like wasted time often has the highest yield in retrospect — because the actual waste is battling the voice of curiosity in your head. The month you spent au pairing in France might teach you more about how you handle discomfort and community than any personality test ever could. The random language you started learning might be the thing that unlocks a country, a job, a person you wouldn't have found otherwise.

We can maximize our fit with our work and our life by “sampling activities, social groups, contexts, jobs, careers — and then reflecting and adjusting. And repeat.” (David Epstein)

Repeat. That’s the part we tend to skip.

so. what’s the thing?

You know the thing I’m talking about. The one you keep almost mentioning and then don’t. The one you googled at 11pm last week and then closed the tab on.

Maybe it’s time :)

Not because it’s guaranteed to work. Not because you know where it leads. But because it keeps coming back. And the things that keep coming back are usually the things worth listening to.

Start somewhere dumb. Do it badly. Don’t post it immediately. Let it be yours for a minute.

Your exploration phase isn’t a detour. It’s the whole thing.

Rooting for you,

Daria 🤍🌏

ps. what's the tab you keep opening and closing? drop it in the comments!!

i already shared mine :)

Leave a comment

🫂 here’s how we can work together:

• The Guide — a 60-minute strategy call followed by a personalised roadmap delivered within 72h. We map your background, goals, constraints, and every viable path open to you: visa logic, program options, application strategy. For people who want a real plan, not a list of random ideas.

• The Guide + Walkthrough — everything in The Guide, plus a second call where we go through your roadmap together and lock in your priorities and first steps. For people who don’t just want to receive a strategy — they want to actually understand it.

• Full Support — everything above, plus three months of biweekly calls, accountability, application feedback, and a strategy that updates as things evolve. For people who want a thinking partner through the whole process of executing, not just planning.

If you’ve been following me for a while, you know that teaching abroad is one of the most accessible ways to actually live somewhere, not just pass through it. It gives you ground: legal, physical, mental. A few months ago, I made a post about teaching English abroad with a focus on Asia,

not really looking at Europe that much. Since then, I've accidentally come across a really interesting Spanish opportunity— and a video about it has reached 2M views.

@gdarusa

Daria Gorbunova on Instagram: "another cool international side …

After a flood of comments and emails asking me to break it all down, I’m finally doing exactly that: a post on Substack and Instagram going through each program in detail.

This might be THE opportunity for people who want to try the siesta, tapas, and wine version of Europe, with a purpose to be there, a routine, and a community. Spain also has more entry points into English teaching than most people realize, which makes it surprisingly low-barrier. Let me break it all down. I’ve organized the programs into three categories — and knowing the difference will save you a lot of confusion.

A heads up for 2026: The Auxiliares de Conversación program is in flux right now

Right now there’s genuine uncertainty around NALCAP and the broader Auxiliares de Conversación program for 2026-2027. Spain’s Labour Ministry (Yolanda Díaz’s team) started investigating regional governments, arguing that language assistants should be official employees with social security contributions — not unpaid or stipend-based “interns.” Andalusia was hit with a 5 million euro fine and actually cancelled all placements for 2025-2026. Multiple other regions (Aragón, Galicia, Valencia, Madrid, Castilla y León, Extremadura, and Murcia) are now expressing concern and some are threatening to pull out entirely.

The bottom line: applications for2026-2027 haven’t opened yet, and it’s still unclear whether the program will run, how it will be restructured, or which regions will even participate. Some placements might be deferred to other regions. Some assistants might end up on waiting lists.

What to do: Keep an eye on the official Ministry of Education website and the r/SpainAuxiliares subreddit — they’ll have real-time updates as soon as there’s news. If NALCAP is your primary plan, have a backup (like private school programs or agencies). This doesn’t mean don’t apply — it means go in with realistic expectations and a Plan B.

category one: the spanish government program

This is the big one. The one everyone talks about. And for good reason.

NALCAP (North American Language and Culture Assistants Program) is run directly by the Spanish Ministry of Education. You’re technically a language and culture assistant, not a full teacher—which matters both legally and practically. You support classroom teachers, lead conversation practice, and basically exist as a living cultural bridge.

• Who it’s for: U.S. and Canadian citizens with a bachelor’s degree (or finishing one)

• Hours: 14–16 hours/week

• Pay: €800–€1,000/month depending on region

• Cost to apply: Free (!!!)

• Locations: Nationwide — you can submit regional preferences, but placement isn’t guaranteed

The pay won’t make you rich. But 14-16 hours a week leaves you with a lot of time to actually explore, freelance, learn Spanish, or pursue whatever else is in your portfolio. That’s the whole point.

⚠️ 2026-2027 program update tldr: major legal issues, program is restructuring, expect delays/changes to the application deadlines + procedures

⚠️ Participants often complain about how unorganized and poorly communicated the program is :(

“The conditions and deadlines for the Language Assistant Program in Spain are currently being reviewed. The call for applications for the 2026-27 school year will be delayed by a few weeks compared to previous calls, and the application deadline will be shortened (we do not have the exact dates at this time).

The program is expected to run from 1 November 2026 to 30 June 2027 (8 months). Joining the program in January 2027 will be an exceptional option, only if vacancies arise in regions that accept this intake.”

(Spanish government website)

category two: private, semi-private, and cooperative school programs

These programs place you in charter or private schools rather than public ones. They typically mean more hours, but often come with additional perks—coursework, community, or better monthly pay.

BEDA (Bilingual Education Development and Assessment) Places language assistants in Catholic schools, primarily in Madrid.

• Hours: 18–24/week | Pay: €873–€1,165/month

• Cost: ~€175 application fee

Worth knowing: Includes actual university coursework + a solid support network. If you care about building credentials alongside experience, this is a detail worth taking seriously.

⚠️ Sometimes you need to use a VPN to open the application link.

🔗Reddit

Meddeas A private/semi-private placement with a strong cultural immersion focus. Nationwide placements.

• Hours: 20–24/week | Pay: €409–€1,236/month

• The wide pay range isn’t a typo—the lower end applies if you choose their host-family living option, where room and board are covered instead

• Cost: Free to apply, but there’s an €850 refundable*** deposit to secure your spot

• Key requirement: Must have graduated within the last four years

🔗Reddit

UCETAM (Unión de Cooperativas de Enseñanza de Trabajo Asociado de Madrid)

This one is genuinely interesting to me —you’re placed in worker-owned, bilingual cooperative schools. Very interesting structure.

• Hours: 18–26/week | Pay: €900–€1,300/month (the highest range in this category)

• Locations: Community of Madrid only

• Cost: ~€250 deposit, refunded at the end of your contract

Up International A smaller, fee-free program placing assistants in private schools. Generally geared toward applicants under 35, with strong documentation support. Good option if you want a private school experience without a high upfront cost.

🔗Reddit

The main caveats to know: Glassdoor reviews flag lower pay than in other programs, and some assistants mention being assigned extracurricular classes they feel are underpaid for. Also Up does NOT place teachers through the Auxiliares de Conversación program — it's direct private school placement.

category three: placement agencies (yes, they cost money — here’s when it’s worth it)

Sometimes the ROI on reducing stress and uncertainty is completely justified. While doing this research, I fell into a rabbit hole of horror stories from auxes (that's what Auxiliares de Conversación participants call themselves) — bureaucracy nightmares, last-minute placement changes, visa chaos. So, if you're risk-averse and want a specific city 100%, paying for that peace of mind might be worth it?

The tradeoff is also real, though: many agencies place you in the same public school roles as NALCAP—you’re essentially paying for guaranteed placement in a specific city, structured orientation, visa support (visas are so not scary tho, you guys!), and someone to call when things go sideways (but they might not be super helpful). Either way, these are the most know companies that can help you with a mission to work in Spain as an English teacher:

CIEE Teach Abroad — ~$2,000 Guarantees placement in Madrid or Murcia. Includes hotel accommodations on arrival, cultural programming, and 24/7 in-country support.

If you’ve never navigated bureaucracy in a foreign language before, this kind of support can be helpful, but again, you can do anything yourself. I believe in you.

🔗Reddit

RVF International — ~$2,099 Step-by-step visa assistance, housing search support, guaranteed public school placement—similar concept to CIEE.

ConversaSpain — ~$1,395 (Murcia) or ~$1,650 (Madrid). Strictly public school placements, but with guaranteed location. Slightly lower price point than the other two.

🔗Reddit

a few routes worth knowing that don’t fit neatly into the above

Instituto Franklin — Teach & Learn in Spain This is a master’s degree program run by the Universidad de Alcalá. You take classes (earning a full 60 ECTS master’s degree) while working as a language assistant in Madrid. You pay tuition (~€4,400), but you receive a stipend for your teaching hours that offsets living costs. If you’re building a portfolio career and want a legitimate European postgraduate credential alongside work experience, this is worth looking at seriously.

🔗Reddit

British Council Language Assistants Same public school jobs as NALCAP, but the pipeline for UK and Irish passport holders. Nearly identical structure, managed by the British Council.

Other nationalities: Spain actively recruits from Australia, New Zealand, India, Singapore, and the Philippines. If you’re not North American or British, the path still exists—it just runs through different channels, sometimes directly through the Spanish embassy in your country.

Fulbright English Teaching Assistant (ETA) Program The most prestigious route for U.S. citizens. Fully funded—flights, health insurance, living stipend. Highly competitive. If you’re a strong candidate who wants a resume-defining experience over a casual one, this is worth the application effort.

so how do you actually choose?

Here’s my honest take, from the perspective of someone who navigated way too many “which way is right” spirals before realizing the question itself was the problem.

The “best” program is the one that fits YOUR actual constraints — not the most impressive one on paper. So instead of asking “which is best,” ask yourself these four things first:

What’s my passport? Ye, that question. This eliminates options immediately and is the most overlooked starting point. NALCAP is North American only. British Council is UK/Irish. Some programs require EU residency. Know your document situation before falling in love with a specific program.

What’s my financial runway? If you’re arriving with minimal savings, the lower pay of some programs combined with Spain’s cost of living (especially Madrid or Barcelona) can catch you off guard. NALCAP’s €800–€1,000/month is liveable in smaller regions, harder in big cities. Factor this in honestly.

How much do I hate uncertainty? If visa bureaucracy and placement lotteries genuinely stress you out — pay for an agency. That peace of mind has real value for some people, especially if you can afford it.

What do I want out of this beyond Spain? If the answer is credentials → BEDA, UCETAM, or Instituto Franklin. If it’s maximum free time to pursue other things → NALCAP. If it’s a soft landing with community built in → CIEE or RVF. If it’s just boots on the ground in a specific city → ConversaSpain.

None of these are the Wrong Answer. They’re just different configurations of the same opportunity — and the one that fits your actual life will always beat the one that looks best on a comparison chart.

Which one sounds like YOUR different way? 🌏

As always, if you want to map this out for your actual situation — your passport, your background, your timeline, your finances — that’s exactly what my 60-minute strategy call is for. Spain is just one piece of the puzzle. I work with global citizens and multipassionates, figuring out all kinds of paths: education, visas, relocation, volunteering, portfolio careers, and everything in between. So if you have questions that go beyond Spain, bring them all. We’ll figure out what actually makes sense for your life.

book a call with me!

Hugs,

Daria 🤍

I’m in a philosophical mood today, so expect this post to be a bit abstract—but no less important. The name of my Substack is Different Way, and it’s something I’m still growing the theory around. But here’s the core: your way is right if it feels authentic to you and fulfills the point. Do what you want. There’s no universal meaning (this is the assumption I stand by okay), hence no one way to do things.

Let me start with a small anecdote about my childhood that might unlock something for you.

the village kid who didn’t know she needed to know how to do before doing

If you ended up on this page, I bet you’ll be able to relate. I was very “productive” as a kid, doing a lot of different things. But it wasn’t ballet and piano my parents sent me to. My flex is that I grew up in a Siberian village in the forest where we had nothing. My school could barely provide an okay education, so all the stuff I was doing came from my imagination—inspired by cartoons, movies, books, music, and my surroundings.

I was crafting something all the time with all the possible and impossible materials. I tested theories that would randomly pop into my head.

Here’s the most important thing to understand: I didn’t know anything, basically. I wasn’t taught to sew, but I was still making sock puppets because I saw them once in a cartoon, so the next day my dad just couldn’t find the socks he left on a chair. I was making comics, drawing, DIYing stuff. I did chemistry experiments only knowing that “I’m doing something that the TV people called “chemistry.””

Back then I didn’t know “I needed to know how to do them first” before actually doing. I was trying my way through. And they worked. Not perfectly, not optimally—but they worked. They were real. I still have those poor sock puppets back home.

curious to see my village?

then we grew up and learned too much

Now I can’t boil eggs without asking chatGPT whether there is a more optimized way to do that.

Don’t get me wrong—knowledge and the desire to do things well aren’t bad in their core. But when we treat optimization as a holy grail, it ruins the human experience. Most of the time, we know enough to start and figure it out in the process. And that figuring-it-out part? That’s the whole point. You lived through it. You didn’t just get from point A to point B following someone else’s map.

That’s actually why I have beef with extreme specialization and… online instruction manuals for life.

when did we decide there’s only one Right Way?

Here’s something we forget: No one actually knows how to live “the right way.” It’s everyone’s first life. Your parents? First time. That influencer with the perfect morning routine? First time. That LinkedIn success story? Also their first time.

Yet somehow we’re all pretending there’s a manual, and we’re the only ones who didn’t get the assignment.

Here’s the question that actually bothers me: Why are we convinced there are only one, max two, acceptable and normal ways to experience life? Am I hallucinating, or is this actually true???

There’s undeniable social pressure with timelines and exact things we’re supposed to accomplish by certain points in our lives. Yet ironically, the internet and social media show us more diverse ways to live than ever before. It’s not just our close circle we have access to anymore.

But the trap is in us getting overstimulated with so many hacks, tricks, optimization strategies, and maximization formulas that we’ve drowned out our own signal. That access creates a misleading perception that you can find the guide to your perfect life online. The result is informational overload and paralysis—either not doing anything at all or just following the loudest voices, convincing ourselves we don’t know enough to build our lives the “most optimal, best way.”

I’m so guilty of this. Constantly looking at others to validate my choices. Scrolling through someone else’s life strategy to confirm mine. Checking and double-checking that I’m doing it “right.”

We’ve confused having options with needing to find the one perfect option.

so if there’s no one Right Way, what does that actually mean for How We Live?

It means your way is valid. It means a “different way” is basically just your way. I call it “different” because it will be a bit or a lot different from the way your neighbor lives, how I live, how anyone else lives.

For me, it’s choosing to split time between countries instead of “settling down.” It’s having a portfolio career instead of one job title. It’s running a four-month experiment where I pursue six different things simultaneously just to see what sticks—because the traditional advice to “pick one thing” literally put me into depression.

Here’s what annoys me: We make it a cute argument about what to put first—cereal or milk—or whether someone likes pineapple pizza. But when I say I don’t want to have one job or live in only one country, suddenly I’m seen as a personal attack.

Well, I understand why. We see different and alternative as a threat to ours. Maybe that was the case a long time ago when resources were scarce and survival meant conformity. But now? We’re so cool***** and developed that we can be fine with our differences. We can support and appreciate each other. We don’t have to defend our choices by attacking someone else’s (?)

***** are we?

coming full circle at 22

I’m 22, and I’m coming back to the intuitional and anecdotal way of navigating how I want to live my life. Yes, I’m using that—my gut, my curiosity, my lived experience—to make the biggest decisions in my life: where to live, what to do, and how to do it.

And I feel like I’m living again. Like when I was a kid making sock puppets without a tutorial.

Because here’s what I’ve learned through my chaotic four-month experiment of pursuing six different things at once: Clarity doesn’t come from choosing the “right” path. It comes from permission to try your path.

The answer was already in me. I just had to remove the noise and listen.

So maybe this post can become your validation to stop looking for validation?

Because here’s the truth: the village kid who made sock puppets without a tutorial wasn’t naive. She wasn’t doing it wrong by not researching the optimal puppet-making technique. She was doing it exactly right—living, trying, figuring it out.

Start with one small thing you’ve been overthinking. Now do it badly, without research, just to see what happens.

Your way is different. And that’s not just okay—it’s the entire point.

If you’re ready to figure out what YOUR different way actually looks like, I’ve created something for exactly this moment—because I’ve been exactly where you are, paralyzed by options and drowning in other people’s maps.

🫂 this is how I can help:

60-minute call + personalised 6–12 month strategy

This is for people who want a global life strategy, not random ideas. We spend 60 minutes mapping your background, interests, constraints, finances, energy, and long-term goals. I work as a global opportunities strategist—matching you with education, jobs, volunteering, language programs, visas, and hybrid paths that are funded or cheap whenever possible.

I also work with mindset a lot, so if you’re overwhelmed or confused in your multipassionality and the lack of clarity on what to do in your life—please come.

Book your call

What’s your “sock puppet”—the thing you used to do without needing permission or optimization? I’d love to hear about it. Drop a comment below. 🤍🌏

Hugs,
Daria

Happy–almost–2026, my dear global citizens and multipassionates!

I’ve reflected on the last 4 months way more than on the previous 8. Everything before September feels irrelevant now—but it prepared me for today and let me be here calm and clear.

My summer was a foggy in-between season: I looked up one day and realized I’d been using someone else’s compass for so long that I’d forgotten my own coordinates. Meanwhile, the first part of the year felt like one long finish line—for uni, the country I lived in, my understanding of myself, and my ego!!!

Thanks to this grounding year, I expect my 2026 to be epic in travel, rich in experiences, and full of opportunities to help people who are also looking for a different way in life. I’m grateful for it—and very ready to start my next season 🫶

But let me first wrap up with the experiment I’ve been running for the past 4 months! I also talked about it here when I was right in the middle of it:

In short, I ran the dumbest, most delicious experiment: try everything at once, let myself look like a clown, and pay attention to what still felt warm after the embarrassment cooled. I called it “killing my ego by a thousand side quests.” 9 design gigs (pay-what-you-can), 24 Russian classes, 100+ short form videos, 7 Substack posts, 1 Erasmus application and 6 more MA applications started, a 1B Korean certificate.

None of these are “impressive” by LinkedIn standards—no six-figure launch, no blue check. But they gave me the one thing money can’t short-cut: internal certainty and CLARITY. I now know that as long as I wake up with my own curiosity, I’ll be fine. That’s it.

If you, too, are paralyzed by multipassionate FOMO, try the buffet method: sample until your soul gets full — it might lead you to the one thing you’d actually want to dedicate yourself to. Four months of chaos > five years of “what if.” Clarity is a product; confusion is just R&D.

2026 brief: keep the compass, toss the map. See you in somewhere in the world!

Good luck!

Hugs,
Daria

As a multipassionate, globally curious person, my goal is to explore all the different ways out there (basically anything besides a corporate 9–5), and teaching a foreign language abroad is one option I’ve been eyeing for a while 👀

I am a certified and experienced Russian teacher, but I’ve been teaching exclusively online. I have taught in-person and abroad before, although not languages. It was math (bet you didn’t expect that if you know me) and arts. I’ve held nearly every teaching position imaginable.

However, I was able to get those previous positions only because I was already in the country and applied as a resident. The kind of job we’ll be talking about today, though, will likely fly you in, provide housing, a visa, and sometimes even meals.

That job is teaching English abroad.

Teaching English abroad is one of those rare paths that looks romantic on Instagram, practical on paper, and beautifully chaotic in real life. I genuinely appreciate this opportunity because it’s so much more than “just a job”—it is a strategic visa play and a bold lifestyle pivot.

This post is here to help you move with intention. I’ve spent the past week deep-researching into the BIG PICTURE of this global opportunity. This topic requires a thousand in-depth posts, but I’m here to simply share that something like this exists!

Read it, save it, and share it with that friend who’s always talking about moving away but doesn’t know where to start.

Share Daria’s Different Way

0. In short

It’s a global industry that grew after WWII when English became the language of diplomacy, business, and globalization. Countries hire native or fluent speakers to teach English in schools, universities, or language centers, offering them visas, housing, and a salary. For many, it’s less about “teaching forever” and more about cultural exchange, mobility, and a legal way to live abroad while earning.

1. Your main priorities (your “why”)

Before you open a single job board, you need to be brutally honest with yourself. This isn’t just about teaching; it’s about what you want your life to look like outside the classroom. Pick one main driver:

• Money: You want to pay off student loans or save for a house. You are willing to work harder or live in a less “party-heavy” environment to bank $1,000–$2,000 USD a month.

  • Where to go: The Middle East (UAE, Saudi Arabia), China, or South Korea.

• Travel & lifestyle: You want to work 15–20 hours a week, sip cheap wine on a terrace, and travel every weekend. You are okay with breaking even financially or saving very little.

  • Where to go: Spain, Vietnam, Thailand, Latin America.

• Career Advancement: You want to be a professional educator long-term.

  • Where to go: International Schools (requires a home-country license) or Universities.

2. The main types of jobs

Not all English teaching jobs are created equal. In fact, they are wildly different worlds.

A. Government programs

These are run by the country’s Ministry of Education (e.g., JET in Japan, EPIK in South Korea, NALCAP in Spain, TAPIF in France).

• Pros: Reliable pay, legit visas, huge support networks (you aren’t alone), and usually a “normal” M-F schedule with evenings off.

• Cons: Long application processes (6+ months), and you rarely get to choose your specific city placement. You could end up in Tokyo, or you could end up in a rice paddy 4 hours from the nearest train station.

B. Private language academies

These are after-school centers (e.g., Hagwons in Korea, Eikaiwas in Japan, Training Centers in China).

• Pros: Hired year-round, you can choose your exact city, often higher pay than public schools.

• Cons: You work when kids are out of school (evenings and weekends), strictly for-profit (business comes first), and burnout rates are higher.

C. Kindergartens

This deserves its own section because it is a massive part of the market, especially in Asia.

These are full-time immersion schools for ages 3–6. You are essentially their full-time teacher, not just an English tutor. Although I have seen positions only for English teachers in kindergartens. However, I suspect it’s not the rule.

• Vibe: High energy. You will probably sing “Baby Shark” 400 times. You will wipe noses. You will be exhausted.

• Pay: Usually higher than public schools or academies because the work is physically draining. In China and Korea, “Kindy” jobs often pay the premium salaries.

• Catch: Parents pay a fortune for these schools, so the pressure on you to make their child a genius is high. You are often “on stage” all day with no downtime.

D. International schools

These are legit K-12 schools teaching a Western curriculum (IB, British, American).

• Note: You generally cannot get these with just a TEFL certificate. You need a proper state teaching license from your home country. If you have that, skip the rest—go here. The pay is double, and you get 3 months of paid vacation.

  Subscribe for more different ways 🤍🌏

3. Country-by-country overview

I can’t list every country (literally 100+ of them), but here are the major players where 90% of the jobs are located.

Asia

• South Korea: The sweet spot for first-timers.

  • The Deal: Free furnished apartment (standard) + flight reimbursement + decent salary ($1.8k–$2.3k/month).

  • Savings Potential: High. You can save $1,000/month easily because your rent is $0.

  • The “Pali-Pali” Culture: Korea moves fast. Expect a work-hard culture.

• China: Some of the highest salaries for TEFL teachers right now.

  • The Deal: $2.5k–$4k/month + housing allowance.

  • The Trade-off: Internet censorship (get a VPN before you go), culture shock, and variable contract reliability. If you can handle the chaos, you will bank serious cash.

• Japan: The cultural dream.

  • The Deal: Salaries are similar to Korea, but cost of living is higher and housing is rarely free (you pay key money, deposits, rent).

  • The Verdict: You go here for the culture, the food, and the polite society—not to get rich.

• Vietnam: The best lifestyle balance.

  • The Deal: Pay is high ($1.5k–$2k) relative to the incredibly low cost of living. A beer is $0.50. A meal is $1.50.

  • The Verdict: It got more expensive over the past few years, but you can still live well, eat out every meal, and still save some money. The market is a bit more “wild west” (less hand-holding), but the freedom is unmatched.

• Thailand: The "heart" of the world.

  • The Deal: Salary is lower than its neighbors ($1,000–$1,500 USD/month). You rarely get a free apartment (you’ll pay ~$200–$400 for a nice studio with a pool), and flights are almost never reimbursed.

  • The "Mai Pen Rai" Culture: "Mai Pen Rai" means "no worries." Compared to the high-pressure Pali-Pali of Korea, Thailand is remarkably laid-back. Expect last-minute schedule changes and a lot of smiles.

Europe

• Spain: The most popular route (NALCAP).

  • The Deal: You are paid a “stipend” (700–1000€) for 12-16 hours a week.

  • The Reality: It is enough to survive in a shared apartment, not to save. You are there for the tapas, the 3-day weekends, and the siestas 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️

• France/Italy: Notoriously difficult for non-EU citizens to get work visas. Most Americans/Canadians working there are on student visas or under-the-table (risky). And it’s harder to find reliable info for that countries.

The Middle East

• UAE / Saudi Arabia:

  • The Deal: Tax-free salaries ($3k–$5k+), free luxury housing, flight allowance.

  • The Catch: They generally require experience and often a Master’s degree or a teaching license. This is rarely a “first job” destination.

4. Where to find real jobs

Not Indeed or LinkedIn. Go where the industry lives.

• Dave’s ESL Cafe: The dinosaur of the industry. It looks like it was built in 1998, but it’s still the gold standard for job listings in Asia.

• TEFL.com: The go-to for Europe and UK-based positions.

• Recruiters (Korea/China): For these countries, use a recruiter. They are free for you (the school pays them). Reputable names include Korvia, Adventure Teaching, or Greenheart Travel.

• Direct Apply: For government programs (JET, EPIK, NALCAP), always apply directly through the official government website. Never pay an agent for this.

• UAE and Saudi Arabia (KSA) is often considered the "Premier League" of teaching abroad. In this region, applying through a reputable agency is much safer than “cold emailing” schools.

  • Teach Away: Great for licensed teachers and public school programs.

  • Teaching Nomad: Highly recommended for Saudi Arabia placements.

  • Footprints Recruiting: Very reliable for the Gulf region.

5. The documents

You will almost certainly need:

1. Bachelor’s Degree: In any major. (Required for the work visa in 95% of countries—it’s an immigration rule, not a school rule).

2. TEFL Certificate: 120-hour minimum.

   • Pro Tip: Do not spend $2,000 on this unless you are doing a CELTA (Cambridge). A $150 Groupon course ticks the visa box for most jobs in Asia. A CELTA is only necessary for Europe or high-tier jobs.

3. Criminal Background Check: This is the bottleneck.

   • USA Citizens: You need an FBI Identity History Summary. It takes 12 weeks by mail, or 1 week if you use an “FBI Channeler” (private company). Use a Channeler.

   • UK Citizens: You need a DBS check (Basic or Enhanced).

4. The Apostille: This is a specialized international notary stamp. Your degree and background check are useless abroad without this stamp. In the US, this is done by the Secretary of State (for degrees) or the Dept of State (for FBI checks). This process can take 2 months.

6. Red flags 🚩 boooo

If you see these in a contract or interview, run.

• “Come on a tourist visa, we’ll fix the work visa later”: ILLEGAL. Do not do this. You can be deported, fined, and blacklisted. Legit schools always process the work visa before you enter (or have a specific legal process for conversion).

• Holding your passport: A school should never keep your physical passport. They may need it for 2 days to register you at immigration, but if they keep it “for safekeeping,” they are holding you hostage.

• “Salary: Up to $X”: “Up to” is not a number. Get the exact base salary in writing.

• Blocked communication: Always ask: “Can I speak to a current foreign teacher at the school?” If they say no, they are hiding something.

• The “Midnight Run”: This is a term in the industry for when a teacher flees the country in the middle of the night because the school was so bad. If you see online reviews mentioning this about a specific school, believe them.

7. Blogs & people to know

Don’t just take my word for it. Check this out:

• International TEFL Academy (ITA): Their “Country Comparison Charts” are the best in the business for quick stats.

• Reddit (r/TEFL & r/TeachingInKorea): The most honest, unfiltered advice you will find.

• “Expat [City Name]” Facebook Groups: Search for “Expats in Seoul” or “Expats in Madrid.” You will see the real complaints, apartment listings, and social events of people living there right now.

Seeing “actual people” living the life is the best way to cut through the noise. These are people that I found and I follow to understand the real life of the an English teacher abroad.

🇰🇷 South Korea (The “EPIK” & Hagwon Life)

I noticed that Korea has the most active vlogging community (?)

• Litha Vlogs (YouTube):

  • Very fresh content (active right now). She recently posted a “Is Teaching in Korea Worth It?” video that is honest about the pros and cons. She balances lifestyle content with “real talk.”

• LydiavsTheWorld (YouTube):

  • She has a dedicated video, "How to Teach English in South Korea | No Experience Needed," which is a perfect primer for you.

• CUTTHELANDLINE (YouTube/Instagram):

  • If you’re worried that social media makes everything look too perfect, this is your antidote.

  • She has a viral video titled "What they DON'T tell you about Korea... | English teaching is a scam?!" where she goes into the industry's darker side—burnout, contract issues, and the emotional toll of moving. She also provides an amazing, super-detailed step-by-step guide to the E-2 teaching visa.

• Just Refiloe (YouTube):

  • Very useful Q&A!

• Georgia Charlotte (YouTube):

  • She taught for one year with EPIK (public schools) and one year at a Hagwon (private academy), giving her the perfect perspective to compare them

And one more very cute inspirational video for you!

🇪🇸 Spain

The Spain community is looser and often focuses on travel and the “struggle” of Spanish bureaucracy (which is very real).

• Maddie’s Mundo (YouTube):

  • She breaks down the two main paths: NALCAP (government-run, public schools) vs. Meddeas (private company, private schools). She explains that while NALCAP is popular and offers more flexibility, Meddeas provides much more support for things like visas and housing.

• Cristina Himelhoch (YouTube):

  • Relatable, aesthetic, and very "day-in-the-life" focused.

• Dreams Traveled (YouTube):

  • "Brutally honest" and focused on the social/financial reality.

🇻🇳 Vietnam

Vietnam content is often high-energy and focused on the low cost of living and chaotic, fun city life.

• Ninja Teacher (YouTube):

  • Kyle started as a teacher and now runs an agency, but his channel is still the encyclopedia for Vietnam. He interviews current teachers constantly, so you get to hear 10 different perspectives on salary, housing, and scams.

• Esiri’s Corner (YouTube):

  • Esiri has been in Vietnam for 3 years and speaks to the realities of the job market.

• Cavern Saga (YouTube):

  • She explains that in Vietnam, you almost always have a Vietnamese TA to help with discipline and translation, which makes the job much easier.

🇯🇵 Japan (The “JET” & Eikaiwa Life)

Japan vlogs tend to focus on the quiet, distinct culture of living there.

I bet you’ve seen videos of this couple — they have 2.4M followers!! But if you want someone “closer to the ground”:

• Allison in Tokyo (YouTube):

  • Pragmatic, Gen-Z, and focused on the ALT vs. Eikaiwa choice.

• Chani Japan (YouTube):

  • Chani was a high school teacher in Australia who moved to rural Japan for a slower pace.

  • Showing that teaching in Japan isn’t just for 22-year-olds. It’s a viable “life reset” for established professionals looking for a 4-day work week and zero “homework” to take home.

• Dianne Dayang in Japan (YouTube):

  • Her vlogs capture the day-to-day aesthetic of living in a Japanese “one-room” apartment and the commute.

🌎 General / “Day in the Life” accounts

• International TEFL Academy (@intteflacademy on Instagram):

  • They do “Instagram Takeovers” almost every day. They give the password to a different graduate in a different country (e.g., one day it’s a teacher in Costa Rica, the next day Taiwan). You can watch their Stories to see a real 24-hour window into their lives.

So… Is teaching English abroad worth it?

If you are running away from your problems, they will follow you. Teaching a room full of screaming six-year-olds in a language you don’t speak does not fix a broken heart or a mid-life crisis.

Or does it?

Sometimes, being forced to explain the word “apple” for the tenth time to a giggling toddler in Seoul, or navigating a silent 1:00 PM siesta in a dusty Spanish town, is exactly what you need to gain some perspective. This job isn’t just about the paycheck; it’s about expanding your capacity for patience and love.

Whether you want the “slow living” beach vibes of Busan, the high-energy “Kindy” hustle, or you’re looking for a global launchpad, this is more than a job. As I said, it is a visa strategy, a lifestyle pivot, and a masterclass in self-reliance.

If you are looking for a way to fund a life of exploration, to challenge your comfort zone, and to realize that there is no “one right way” to live life? Then yes. It is one of the best ticket out there.

If you need help finding the right different way for you — I am here.

🫂This is how I can help:

60-minute call + personalised 6–12 month strategy

This is for people who want a global life strategy, not random ideas.

We spend 60 minutes mapping your background, interests, constraints, finances, energy, and long-term goals. I work as a global opportunities strategist — matching you with education, jobs, volunteering, language programs, visas, and hybrid paths that are funded or cheap whenever possible.

Come say hi!

Good luck,

Daria

Hello, world! 🫂

For the past 3 months, I’ve been working on about 6 different projects/skills every day to answer the question: “What do I want to do with my life?”

— and I DID ANSWER THAT.

Let me share the context and the details.

Maybe this is the advice you’ve been looking for in the endless rhetoric of “just choose one thing already and commit for 20 years.” People who say that to your “I don’t know what to choose” don’t really want to help you. It’s like telling someone who says “I don’t know what to eat” — “just eat anything, and if you eat it long enough, you’ll eventually like it.”

This year, I took an unexpected gap year. I didn’t plan it, but that's just the way it is. And I think it was inevitable, because for a while I’d been stuck in a loop of not understanding what I want. And because I didn’t understand what I wanted, I wouldn’t actually explore anything — mostly because I was scared to commit. What if it’s the wrong thing? Let me waste time thinking about whether the thing is right for me instead of doing it and actually gaining a clear understanding of whether I want to do it or not.

BUT

I didn’t realize that you don’t have to commit long-term because the results* can show up in a short period of time. You can see it within one intentional action — if it moves the needle in the right direction, and if you stop sabotaging yourself.

[ results* here are not some crazy career accomplishments, but internal clarity through exposure ]

Because sometimes you want something, but you’re scared of actually getting it. So you sabotage everything. That’s the first step you should work on if you’re in the same situation: not knowing what to do, feeling stuck, avoiding action. It’s a topic for another conversation.

I stayed in that loop for about three very painful months of summer (the biggest bummer of the story). I spent it crying instead of enjoying the beautiful nature around me. It was also this weird post-graduation period where I’d go on LinkedIn and see my peers getting cool-sounding positions with probably good salaries. I wanted the approval, validation, and praise they seemed to get. I was looking for it externally through fancy jobs. But every time I tried to pursue something similar, I hit an internal block — because deep down, I didn’t want those things. That whole period basically forced me to start interpreting my emotions correctly, because we numb ourselves so much, or intellectualize everything in the entirely wrong way.

During those months, I marinated in my own thoughts, trying desperately to make a choice. At the same time, I was trying to find a job abroad, and to get a sponsored job abroad, you need extremely high, specialized skills. My imposter syndrome was insane. I kept telling myself I didn’t know anything because I didn’t have one deep specialization — just several mid-level skills. I saw myself as “less than.”

I still couldn’t choose “one thing” to niche into, no matter how hard I tried.

I was doing a lot of personal work, trying to understand my identity. If you followed me on Instagram back then (by the way, follow me), you saw video after video about identity, self, and ego, as I figured out what I wanted to do.

follow Daria on insta 🫡

I ended up not choosing one thing. I decided to do the opposite of what everyone told me. Literally every single person advised: “Choose one thing and pursue it.” And I was highly annoyed because I simply couldn’t. So I said: screw it. I started pursuing 6 distinctly different things at the same time. I removed the pressure to succeed in all of them because it’s genuinely unrealistic. My only goal was clarity.

Let me list the things.

1. Teaching Russian as a second language.
   I’ve been doing it for six years. I slowed down, but it was still there. My YouTube and early Instagram were built on it. I had only two students because I had burned out, but I wanted to push through because, once again, I wasn’t ready to let any of the choices go.

2. Graphic design.
   I created a Telegram channel, sent it to friends/ my uni alumni, and made an experiment: “I will do graphic design projects for any budget.” In 2.5 months, I worked on eight different projects, including illustration, branding, websites, and social media campaigns. I didn’t earn much, but I learned a LOT about what I enjoy in design, how exactly I want to pursue it, and the processes of client work.

   Daria's design telegram 👩🏼‍💻

3. Content creation.
   Initially, it was the only thing I did because it served as my self-reflection tool. Posting daily, scripting, editing, and uploading the same day. I built different channels. Made one YouTube video (not now YouTube, not now).

4. Applying to master’s programs.
   Every program requires different essays, statements, and portfolios. I am applying across multiple fields because I am open to all: visual design, arts, digital arts, philosophy, and global education.

5. Learning Korean.
   Because one of my chosen programs is in Seoul 🙂‍↕️

6. Full-time jobs?

   I also applied to corporate jobs and design jobs. I got interviews, and I even got an offer as a business consultant (very random) at an American company in Russia with a very high salary. I ultimately rejected the offer after three rounds of interviews and one role-play. Although I suspected the corporate world wasn’t for me, I wanted actual data to confirm my suspicions. I love how I realized everything already through the interviewing process. It was enough, okay!!

   🤍🌏 Subscribe for more ideas, frameworks, and opportunities for a global and multipassionate life.

I genuinely tried everything to gather input from both inside and outside.

Important context: I didn’t have to pay rent or think about food or survival; I was in the middle of a snowy forest with no friends, just my family. So I could lock myself in my room and work.

I entered this unintentional experiment completely lost. My nervous system was wrecked. I had no clarity. I just… went insane, but in a good way. Sometimes you need that chaos. Like the Big Bang, the universe was created from chaos.

Sometimes you need to create chaos intentionally.

Initially, in September, I tried to maintain a balance: sleep well, eat well, and work 5 hours a day. It helped build the foundation for what came next. But later, I went all in. I would say I was living unhealthily — working 16-hour days, constantly on my computer, writing, brainstorming, and reflecting👩🏼‍💻

BUT

Now, standing here: I am exhausted and burned out — but AH, I AM SO HAPPY!🤍🌏 I can’t continue like this, and that’s PERFECT, because I reached the clarity I needed. I do think I saved myself 5 years of a confused life. It was a sprint, and I am grateful I could do that.

This season is ending. I’m transitioning out of the experiment and stepping into the one thing I truly want 🙂‍↕️ And that thing isssssss…..

Some outcomes:

1. I found clarity.
Clarity is vague, so here’s what it means: coming back to my authentic self and understanding it. I found my voice again. I’m writing this in my real voice — not watered down.

2. Choosing A or B made me realize the answer is C.
Through trying everything (ABCDE…), I realized the answer was something else, something that either encompasses everything or allows multiple things to coexist peacefully. That “umbrella” logic was huge.

3. I understood I’m a multi-passionate person who wants a portfolio career.
This experiment helped me find the language to describe myself. As a language philosopher and post-structuralist, having the right words to describe my identity is everything. Now I understand myself because I have words that match my experience. I normalized my situation and my choices.

4. I accepted that I don’t want to choose — and I don’t have to.
I just need the right structure. Wu Wei (Taoism) taught me not to force things. So I let things unfold. I didn’t force myself to choose one thing and grind for months. I couldn’t choose, but I couldn’t stay still either. So I let the process unfold: taking projects, working more, experimenting. Naturally, I reached a state of burnout and clarity simultaneously.

5. My answer C:
Consulting and mentoring 🤍🌏
Or more precisely: a portfolio career, different projects in different seasons, and helping people do the same. I want to be a guide for the globally curious and multi-passionate. I’ve been doing this unofficially for years. I love global education, mobility, and institutions that help people relocate, learn, and expand their perspectives. This is extremely meaningful to me.

It’s funny, because I started by choosing between philosophy and graphic design, maybe teaching Russian. I considered pursuing a career in academia and becoming a professor (I still might). I pursued everything: I created philosophy content, developed a whole series (Philosophy Keys on Instagram), invested a lot of energy into it, and realized I don’t enjoy discussing philosophy in isolation. I love weaving it into life — like in this post. Identity, language, Taoism — it all blends naturally.

Another big realization: I thought I was a travelholic. I was wrong. That chaotic traveling wasn’t escapism — it was my authentic lifestyle. Trial and error revealed that I’m a “shark” (not loving this metaphor, but you get it): I need to move projects, move countries, move ideas to continue FEELING ALIVE.

And all this clarity came not from looking only within myself, but from the combination of within and without. You need mirrors to see yourself. Some mirrors are warped and harmful, while others reflect the truth.

Now I want to be that mirror for others.

So my final answer to “what do I want to do now?”:

I want to be a mirror for global multi-passionates, generalists, and people for whom the advice “just pick one thing and settle down” feels like complete BS, which it is.

🫂This is how I can help:

60-minute call + personalised 6–12 month strategy

This is for people who want a global life strategy, not random ideas.

We spend 60 minutes mapping your background, interests, constraints, finances, energy, and long-term goals. I work as a global opportunities strategist — matching you with education, jobs, volunteering, language programs, visas, and hybrid paths that are funded or cheap whenever possible.

Hope to see you in my DMs.

Good luck,

Daria

Hello world! 🌍

Today’s topic: learning a language abroad for free. Let’s gooooo.

I always assumed studying a language abroad was a “rich kid activity.” Then I discovered how many governments invest real money into language programs as part of their soft-power politics — and suddenly I am that “rich kid” learning languages abroad :) Super grateful!

I learned English for free in Ireland.
My friends learned German on scholarships in Germany.
Another friend of mine spent eight months studying Mandarin in Taiwan — fully funded, too.

Meanwhile, maaaany students are paying €2,000–€6,000 for summer schools when better, funded equivalents exist, yet nobody tells them. If you’re planning to use a language school mainly to get a work visa, then this list might not be super relevant. I might make a separate post on language schools that do come with work opportunities. But for now…

These are the largest language programs I’ve personally participated in or observed my friends participate in — the ones that cover tuition, housing, stipends, and sometimes even food!! Yuuum!

Let’s fix the information gap 👇

🇹🇷 Turkish — KatipAta Turkish Language & Culture Program

Where: Ankara, Türkiye
What: ~8-month intensive Turkish language + culture (classes, cultural activities, study tours)
Funding: Known as fully funded — tuition + accommodation + major expenses
Who can apply: current public officials, diplomats, academics, or researchers (preferably with postgraduate degrees).

🔗 https://katipata.ytb.gov.tr/

🇩🇪 German — DAAD University Summer Courses

Where: Universities across Germany
What: 3–4 week German language + culture programs (June–September)
Funding:

• Course fees

• Accommodation

• Pocket money / partial stipend

• Sometimes travel support

Who can apply: Students & recent graduates from many countries

Perfect if you want a short-and-funded Europe summer arc.

🔗 https://www2.daad.de/deutschland/stipendium/datenbank/en/21148-scholarship-database/?detail=50035295

🇩🇪 German — IIK Düsseldorf Scholarships

Where: Düsseldorf, Germany
What: German language + culture intensive courses
Funding:

• Generally covers course fees; some calls help with living costs

Who can apply: International learners

Less known but very solid.

🔗 https://www.iik-duesseldorf.de/en/entire-program/funding-opportunities-and-scholarships/iik-scholarships/

🇵🇱 Polish — NAWA Summer Courses of Polish Language & Culture

Where: Poznań, Lublin, Wrocław, etc.
What: 2–4 week Polish language + culture courses
Funding:

• Language classes

• Cultural program

• Accommodation + 3 meals/day (literally everything on-site covered)

Who can apply: Foreign students & academic staff from a wide list of countries

This one gives three meals a day… hello??

🔗 https://nawa.gov.pl/en/the-polish-language/nawa-summer-courses

🇨🇿 Czech — Summer Schools of Slavonic Studies

Where: Prague, Brno, Olomouc, etc.
What: 3–4 week Czech language, literature, history + full cultural immersion
Funding (scholarship):

• Tuition

• Accommodation

• Meals

• Excursions

Who can apply: Students, teachers, translators, and anyone interested in Czech culture (via embassy nomination)

One of the best-funded Slavic language options out there.

🔗 https://msmt.gov.cz/eu-and-international-affairs/summer-schools-of-slavonic-studies-2025?lang=2

🇹🇼 Mandarin in Taiwan — Huayu Enrichment Scholarship

Where: Approved Mandarin centers in Taiwan
What: 3–12 months of Mandarin study
Funding:

• Monthly stipend (NT$25,000) — often enough to cover tuition + living if you budget well

Who can apply: Many nationalities; each embassy publishes its own call

🔗 https://www.roc-taiwan.org/uk_en/post/10593.html

🇨🇳 Mandarin in China — International Chinese Language Teachers Scholarship

Where: Multiple Chinese universities
What: One-semester or one-year Chinese language study
Funding:

• Tuition

• On-campus housing

• Living stipend

• Medical insurance

Who can apply: International applicants with certain HSK levels

🔗 https://admission-is.bnu.edu.cn/english/international/internationalchinese/index.html

🇯🇵 Japanese — MEXT (Japanese Studies Students)

Where: Universities across Japan
What: 1-year Japanese language + culture program
Funding:

• Round-trip airfare

• Tuition

• Monthly stipend

Who can apply: Undergraduate students majoring in Japanese/Japan studies

Super funded, super competitive, very specific.

🔗 https://www.studyinjapan.go.jp/en/smap-stopj-applications-japanese.html

🇭🇺 Hungarian — Balassi Institute Hungarian Language & Cultural Studies

Where: Budapest, Hungary
What: 1-year Hungarian language + culture program
Funding:

• Tuition

• Accommodation

• Stipend

Who can apply: Mostly Hungarian diaspora youth

Niche.

🔗 https://balassieducation.hu/en/study-programmes/hungarian-language-and-cultural-studies-programme/

🇲🇦 Arabic — Ibn Battuta Scholarships (Morocco)

Where: Rabat (Qalam wa Lawh Center)
What: Intensive Arabic programs (semester, summer, winter)
Funding (full scholarship):

• Tuition

• Housing

Who can apply: International students

Doesn’t cover travel, but it's still an insane value.

🔗 https://www.qalamcenter.com/admissions/ibn-battuta-scholarships

🇸🇦 Arabic — Arabic for Non-Native Speakers (Saudi Arabia)

Where: King Saud University + similar institutes
What: Arabic language & culture program
Funding:

• Usually tuition exemption

• Sometimes stipends + housing (varies by call)
  Who can apply: Broad international eligibility

One of the few funded options in the Gulf.

🔗 https://arabiccenter.ksaa.gov.sa/en/home

🌍 Bonus: European Solidarity Corps (Volunteering + Language Support)

Not a language school, but an elite immersion hack.

Where: EU + partner countries
What: 2–12 month volunteering projects with local integration + language support
Funding:

• Accommodation

• Food allowance

• Pocket money

• Insurance

Who can apply: 18–30 from EU/partner countries

🔗 https://youth.europa.eu/solidarity_en

How to find more of these for ANY language

1. Search like this:

• “[Language] and culture program” scholarship

• “summer course” “[Language]” fully funded

• “[Country] national agency” language course

2. Check official scholarship portals:

• Ministries of Education, Culture, Foreign Affairs

• National Academic Exchange Agencies

• Cultural Institutes (Goethe, Instituto Cervantes, etc.)

There are way more of these programs than people realize — you just need to know where to look.

And if you ever feel stuck or overwhelmed searching on your own, this is literally what people come to me for.

You can come to me when you…

🌍 want to try living abroad in a low-pressure way (volunteering, seasonal work, short programs)
🎓 want to study abroad but feel overwhelmed by programs and deadlines
🧭 want a gap year or sabbatical but don’t know how to structure it
✈️ want to travel/live abroad for a few months but don’t know how to afford it
🔀 feel stuck choosing between too many possible directions
🌱 feel pressured to “pick one path” but they’re multipassionate
♻️ want a nonlinear, flexible life but need help designing the next 6–12 months
🤔 know they want “something different” but can’t name what
📝 want someone to help analyze their situation and suggest concrete opportunities

🫂This is how I can help:

60-minute call + personalised 6–12 month strategy

This is for people who want a global life strategy, not random ideas.

We spend 60 minutes mapping your background, interests, constraints, finances, energy, and long-term goals. I work as a global opportunities strategist — matching you with education, jobs, volunteering, language programs, visas, and hybrid paths that are funded or cheap whenever possible.

Good luck,

Daria

Hello world!

This year, while applying to grad schools myself, I got super overwhelmed by how many incredible master’s programs actually exist. Turns out, there are way more fully funded options in the world than anyone ever mentions — tuition covered, monthly stipend, flights, insurance, sometimes even a language course.

But here’s the thing: it’s not about finding a funded program — it’s about finding the one that fits you. Because even though there are tons of opportunities, only a handful will truly match your background, goals, and future plans.

To help you see the big picture of graduate school opportunities, I've created this post. I researched, cross-checked all the sources, and organized everything by region and country, including:

✓ official links
✓ typical deadlines
✓ what each program covers
✓ who they’re best for

Let’s get into it.

1. Big Global & Government Scholarships

(fund across universities, not tied to a single program)

These are the universal ones — you apply once, and they fund almost any master’s degree in eligible countries.

🇪🇺🇬🇧Europe & UK

Erasmus Mundus Joint Masters (EU)

The boss of fully funded programs.
You study the same degree across 2–3 countries, rotating campuses.

Covers:

• Full tuition

• ~€1,400 monthly stipend

• Travel + insurance

• Sometimes installation allowance

Fields: literally everything — from AI to heritage studies to food science. VERY DIVERSE!

Official portal: https://www.eacea.ec.europa.eu/scholarships/erasmus-mundus-catalogue
(Search the list of funded programs)

Deadline:
Most programs close October–January each year (varies by program).
→ Many popular programs: Dec 15–Feb 15.

Chevening Scholarship (UK)

👉 The key requirement:

You must be a citizen of a Chevening-eligible country AND
be currently living in that country when you apply (with very few exceptions).

As a Russian citizen, I can’t participate because my country is currently suspended (what a surprise).

BUT

Chevening is open to over 160 countries, including tons of places across Europe, Asia, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East.

One-year master’s at any UK university.
Ideal if you want career acceleration + UK network.

Covers:

• Tuition (up to £20–30k)

• Monthly stipend

• Flights

• Visa + TB test

• Arrival allowance

Official site: https://www.chevening.org/apply/

Deadline:
Applications open August and close early November every year.

Commonwealth Scholarships (UK)

For citizens of eligible countries across the Commonwealth.

Covers: tuition, stipend, flights, thesis grant, and more.

Fields: STEM, policy, development, engineering, education, etc.

Official site: https://cscuk.fcdo.gov.uk/scholarships/

Deadline:
Usually September–October.

DAAD Scholarships (Germany)

Key schemes include:

• EPOS (Development-Related Postgraduate Courses)

• Helmut-Schmidt (Public Policy & Good Governance)

Covers:

• Free or very low tuition

• €934–€1,300 stipend

• Health insurance

• Travel allowance

• German language course (2–6 months)

Great for: social sciences, engineering, sustainability, public policy, development, architecture.

Official site: https://www.daad.de/en/study-and-research-in-germany/scholarships/daad-scholarship-database/

Deadline:
Depends on program, usually August–October.

Helmut-Schmidt-Programme (DAAD PPGG) – for public policy

Official site: https://www.daad.de/en/study-and-research-in-germany/scholarships/helmut-schmidt-programme/

Deadline:
June–July yearly.

Eiffel Excellence Scholarship (France)

France’s elite scholarship for high-achieving international students.

Covers:

• Monthly stipend

• International transport

• Insurance

• Cultural activities

• Campus housing allowance

Tuition is technically not included, but most universities waive or subsidize it for Eiffel scholars.

Official site: https://www.campusfrance.org/en/eiffel-scholarship-program-of-excellence

Deadline:
Universities submit candidates → internal deadlines Oct–Dec.
Final Campus France deadline: January.

Swedish Institute Scholarships (Sweden)

Highly competitive but life-changing.

Covers:

• Full tuition

• SEK ~11,000/month stipend

• Insurance

• Travel grant

Fields: sustainability, environmental science, human rights, data, tech, leadership, etc.

Official site: https://si.se/en/apply/scholarships/swedish-institute-scholarships-for-global-professionals/

Deadline:
Application window: February (after your university application in January).

Türkiye Scholarships / Türkiye Bursları (Türkiye)

Very generous government scholarship. Go Türkiye <3

Covers:

• Tuition

• Accommodation in student dorms

• Monthly stipend

• Healthcare

• 1-year Turkish language course

• Round-trip flights

Fields: humanities, design, engineering, Islamic studies, social sciences.

Official site:

https://www.turkiyeburslari.gov.tr/

Deadline:
Applications open January 10 – February 20 yearly.

🇺🇸🇨🇦 USA & North America

Fulbright Foreign Student Program (USA)

THE scholarship for international students — the one people brag about for life.

Covers:

• Full tuition

• Monthly stipend

• Insurance

• Flights

• Cultural programming

Strong fit: people with research interests, leadership potential, and community work.

Official site:

https://foreign.fulbrightonline.org/

Deadline:
Varies by country → usually February–June for the next academic year.

McCall MacBain Scholarship (Canada)

Canada’s version of Rhodes.

Covers:

• Tuition at participating universities

• Monthly stipend

• Leadership training

• Summer funding

Programs: education, design, public health, arts, engineering, sustainability, law (depending on university).

Official site:

https://mccallmacbainscholars.org/apply/

Deadline:
June–August registration,
September application deadline.

P.E.O. International Peace Scholarship

For international women pursuing graduate study in the US or Canada.

Covers: significant portion of tuition + living costs (exact amount varies).
Great add-on if your degree is partially funded.

Official site: https://www.peointernational.org/

Deadline:
Eligibility form opens September 15, closes December 15.

Additional North American opportunities:

Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarships (mostly PhD but some master’s/PhD routes)

Official:

https://vanier.gc.ca/en/home-accueil.html
Deadline: October

University-Specific Full Funding Examples

These are not widely advertised but exist:

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Fellowships for:

• Public Health

• Epidemiology

• Policy

• Social protection

Some packages = full tuition + stipend.

Funding page: https://publichealth.jhu.edu/academics/tuition-and-funding

Deadlines vary by program (typically Dec–Jan).

Many US universities also offer:

• Graduate assistantships (teach/research → tuition waiver + stipend)

• Departmental fellowships

• Leadership scholarships

• Diversity fellowships

Search trick:

Type “[university name] + graduate assistantship + master’s” on Google.

🌏Asia-Pacific

MEXT Scholarship (Japan)

Japan’s golden scholarship.

Covers:

• Tuition

• Monthly stipend

• Flights

• Prep Japanese language program (up to 1 year)

You can apply through:

• Embassy track

• University track
  (Both competitive, but worth it.)

Official site:
Embassy track → check your local Japanese embassy

University track → check your desired uni site

This is a useful website for more information in general (government approved): https://www.studyinjapan.go.jp/en/planning/scholarships/mext-scholarships/

Deadline:
Embassy track: April–June
University track: December–February

GKS / Global Korea Scholarship (South Korea)

1 year Korean language + 2 years master’s.

Covers:

• 100% tuition

• KRW 1,000,000–1,500,000 monthly stipend

• Arrival allowance

• Settlement allowance

• Insurance

• Round-trip flights

Super attractive if you want to study design, media, AI, humanities, or international relations.

Official site: https://www.studyinkorea.go.kr/en/sub/gks/allnew_invite.do

Deadline:
Varies, but generally:
Embassy track → September–October
University track → February–March

Australia Awards (Australia)

For students from eligible partner countries.

Covers:

• Tuition

• Living stipend

• Health insurance

• Flights

• Academic support

Official site: https://www.dfat.gov.au/people-people/australia-awards/australia-awards-fellowships

Deadline:
Usually February–April.

New Zealand / Manaaki Scholarships

Very generous for students from the Global South.

Covers:

• Tuition

• Living stipend

• Establishment allowance

• Flights

Official site: https://www.nzscholarships.govt.nz/

Deadline:
Usually Mid-February–March.

2. Fully Funded Master’s at Specific Universities (“Branded Programs”)

These are the elite, prestige “once in a lifetime” fellowships.

🇬🇧 UK

Rhodes Scholarship (Oxford)

The oldest, most famous scholarship.

Covers:

• Tuition

• College fees

• Stipend

• Travel

• Research funding

Any master’s available at Oxford.

Official site: https://www.rhodeshouse.ox.ac.uk/scholarships/

Deadline:
Most countries: June–August.

Clarendon Fund (Oxford)

Full funding for any Oxford grad program.

Extremely competitive, but a lot more spots than Rhodes.

Official site: https://www.ox.ac.uk/clarendon

Deadline:
Automatically considered when you apply to Oxford by December–January.

Gates Cambridge (Cambridge)

Full tuition, stipend, flights, academic development grant.

Programs: almost everything except a few professional degrees.

Official site:

https://www.gatescambridge.org/

Deadline:
Non-US students: December–Early January.

🇨🇳 China

Schwarzman Scholars (Tsinghua, Beijing)

One-year Master of Global Affairs.

Covers everything, from tuition to food to study trips to business attire stipend.

Official site:

https://www.schwarzmanscholars.org/

Deadline:
Applicants outside China: May–September.

Yenching Academy (Peking University)

For students interested in China studies, humanities, social sciences.

Fully funded: tuition + accommodation + stipend + flights.

Official site:

https://yenchingacademy.pku.edu.cn/

Deadline:
Varies, but usually November–December.

🇺🇸 USA

Knight-Hennessy Scholars (Stanford)

The most generous program in the US right now.

You choose any Stanford master’s degree, and Knight-Hennessy pays for it + adds leadership training, cohort, retreats.

Fields: design, engineering, education, law, business, humanities, sustainability.

Official site: https://knight-hennessy.stanford.edu/

Deadline:
Usually October (before Stanford’s own degree deadlines).

My Strategy

As of December 2025, I’m applying to a couple of Erasmus Mundus programs and the Global Korea Scholarship. Follow the journey and see how it works out :)

Follow Daria on Instagram

Here’s the strategy I’m using:

1. I started 3–6 months early

Starting early is non-negotiable if you want to avoid panic decisions and have a buffer for things you cannot control — like professors taking time with recommendation letters or unexpected bureaucratic delays.

2. I’m leading with my story and mission (way more important than GPA)

Your mission — and how your skills align with the program’s mission — is the real match made in heaven.
These programs consistently prioritize:

• leadership

• global curiosity

• impact

• clarity of purpose

• resilience

…not a perfect transcript.

3. I’m applying to several programs, but intentionally

It’s worth noting that even though I’m applying to programs in completely different fields and countries, I’m doing it with depth, not chaos-energy.
Quality > quantity
But quantity with quality? even better.

Evaluate your energy and time before choosing your strategy — but I would never apply to just one program. Diversify, but do it thoughtfully.

4. I study the vibe of past winners

As much as I believe in my exceptional nature (lol), studying the profiles of past scholars is incredibly useful.
Not to copy, but to understand:
How do successful applicants frame their stories?
What themes do they emphasize?
What tone do they use?

It helps you present yourself in the strongest, clearest way.

5. I don’t self-reject

Every year thousands of students don’t apply because they assume,
“I won’t get it.”
I’m simply… not doing that.

Most of the best opportunities I’ve had in life were ones I initially thought were “out of my league.”
So I apply. Always.
If it’s meant for me, it’s mine — but only if I actually click “submit.”

Want to study abroad for free but don’t know where to start?

If you feel overwhelmed by deadlines, funding pages, and eligibility requirements — I can help.

60-minute call + personalised 6–12 month strategy

This is for people who want a global life strategy, not random ideas.

We spend 60 minutes mapping your background, interests, constraints, finances, energy, and long-term goals. I work as a global opportunities strategist — matching you with education, jobs, volunteering, language programs, visas, and hybrid paths that are funded or cheap whenever possible.

Good luck,

Daria

A few months after graduating, I had entered a period of life that felt weirdly similar to my favorite cartoon, Hedgehog in the Fog. My inner landscape resembled that quiet, opaque world where you walk without fully understanding where you’re heading, what’s ahead, or whether the next step even belongs to you. I was lost in a subtle, existential way, the kind that makes ordinary decisions feel strangely heavy.

Everyone around me seemed to know what came next for them. I’m pretty sure it is an illusion, but still. They applied to jobs, accepted offers, moved to cities, enrolled in programs, and spoke about their future with a confidence I could not locate in myself. It wasn’t that I wanted their lives, or maybe I did on some level; it was simply the contrast between their apparent direction and my internal fog that made everything feel more confusing. I didn’t have the words to describe what I was experiencing. I didn’t know that being multipassionate was a thing. I didn’t know how to articulate the dissonance between what I was “supposed” to want and what I actually felt. Mostly, I just knew that every option presented to me felt misaligned.

The confusion was less like “I don’t know what I want” and more like apathy mixed with shame — a quiet fear that maybe I was incapable of wanting anything at all. And when you can’t name your desires, it’s easy to assume something is fundamentally wrong with you. But what I later understood is that the issue wasn’t a lack of desire; it was a lack of belief in my desire. I couldn’t envision the life I wanted because I didn’t see examples of people living that way. When nothing around you mirrors your internal compass, it’s natural to assume your compass is broken.

Eventually, something shifted. It wasn’t a sudden epiphany, but a gradual acceptance that I simply did not want the things I saw around me. And that this wasn’t a failure — it was information to analyse. When I stopped forcing myself to want the “logical path,” the fog didn’t disappear, but it became easier to move through. I could admit, at least privately, that my desires lived outside conventional categories. I wanted a life designed around seasons, experiments, global movement, and creative work. That my curiosity was wider than a single job title. And once I normalized this for myself, I could finally begin exploring again.

However, clarity didn’t come from thinking. It came from experimenting.

For the past four months, I have thrown myself into an unusual amount of parallel experimentation — teaching, working with design clients, managing social media, conducting intensive research on global opportunities, applying to programs, and navigating several creative and intellectual interests simultaneously. It was a lot. It was, at times, almost too much. But it taught me more about myself than years of overthinking ever did. Trying different paths in real-time allowed me to see which ones energized me, which drained me, and which revealed entirely new interests I would never have discovered otherwise.

This is also the biggest pattern I see in people who feel stuck: they try to think their way into clarity instead of moving towards it. They wait for certainty before taking the first step. They research endlessly but avoid experimenting. They fear making the “wrong” choice so intensely that they make no choice at all. But clarity is rarely the result of contemplation alone. It emerges through action, through exposure, through movement — even if the movement feels imperfect or incomplete.

If I could give you one practical starting point, it would be honesty.

Brutal Kind honesty with yourself about what you want, what you don’t want, and what you’re afraid to admit out loud. Honesty is the foundation for every next step. When someone comes to me and says, “I don’t know what I want,” I always ask them two questions: What makes you excited? and What makes you want to live? These are inconvenient questions because they bypass logic and go straight to the core of desire. But they work.

If you’re reading this because you genuinely don’t know what comes next, here is a small framework:

1. Name your season.
Are you in a season of rest? Exploration? Reinvention? Ambition? Your next step depends on the season you’re in, not the season you wish you were in.

2. Choose one experiment.
You don’t need a five-year plan. You need the next experiment — something small enough to try, meaningful enough to learn from.

3. Let clarity reveal itself gradually.
Clarity rarely arrives as a dramatic revelation. It often looks like a faint sense of excitement returning. It feels like energy. For me now, clarity feels like wanting things again — like a quiet re-entry into aliveness.

PS. if you’re sitting in your own fog and trying to figure out what comes next — even though a part of you knows that action is the only way out — check out my 1:1 sessions. We can map out your action plan together.

When you’re ready, here are a few ways I can help:

🌏 THE YEAR MAP SESSION

A 90-minute deep-dive where we identify your season, clarify what you actually want (not what you think you should want), explore meaningful directions for the next 6–12 months, and build a personalized Year Map with concrete next steps, curated opportunities, and a 30-day action plan.

🌿 OPPORTUNITY MENTORSHIP (1–3 months)

For people navigating real transitions — career shifts, gap years, international mobility, multipassionate pivots. We work together through research, decision-making, emotional regulation, and strategic action.

🍂 GAP YEAR & SEASONAL LIFE DESIGN

If you’re craving a reset, we structure your year into intentional seasons, aligned experiences, and opportunities that match who you are becoming.

🧭 PERSONAL OPPORTUNITY CURATION

You tell me about your interests and constraints; I find 10–15 programs, jobs, residencies, or study opportunities that align with your direction — including deadlines, pros/cons, and the simplest possible next steps.

The best thing I’ve done in the past few months is finally embracing my natural desire to live everywhere and do everything. If you feel something similar, I hope you let yourself accept it too — because half of that toxic overthinking and rumination might actually come from rejecting a very real part of who you are.

For years, I was genuinely angry at myself for not being able to “just choose something.” I talk more about my personal story here:

I love many things, but I do not want to marry any of them. I want to live everywhere and do everything, and for a long time, that felt like a personal defect.

Because the world kept repeating the same script:

pick one identity

choose a lane

don’t confuse people (as if confusion isn’t half the fun…)

If you’re multipassionate: a generalist, curious to the point of self-sabotage, allergic to sameness, and permanently interested in ten things at once, you probably know this feeling in your bones.

I needed to read this two weeks ago but couldn’t find it, so I’m writing it now in case you need it too.

This is for the people who want a life that actually matches who they are — not the “one path, one office, one country” template we inherited, but a nonlinear, seasonal, global existence that moves the way your brain naturally moves.

If that sounds like you, welcome. Let’s build a life that feels intentionally designed, with your values, rhythms, and possibilities at its center.

Why the traditional career model collapses for generalists

Here is the part most people never say out loud: some brains are not built for long-term specialization. And honestly, I think most people are generalists to some degree — it’s just that not everyone follows their curiosity to the edges the way we do.

It has nothing to do with being flaky or undisciplined or “too much” :(

Generalists:

• move horizontally instead of vertically

• get bored when depth stops revealing new patterns

• expand instead of narrowing

The more I studied philosophy, design, politics, languages, education, and global mobility, the more obvious it became: I don’t grow by going deeper into one single corridor. I grow by standing at intersections. I peak in rotations. I think best when I hold multiple domains at once and let them cross-pollinate.

And the world has always needed people like that:

• the dot-connectors

• the pattern-readers

• the multi-tool thinkers

• the hybrid builders

• the people who can navigate fog, not maps!

Specialization made sense in an industrial society. It makes less sense now. And with AI taking over narrow tasks at scale, the advantage shifts even more toward people who can connect, translate, integrate, and invent.

A new era is beginning — the era of portfolio careers.

The real question: if I can do many things, how do I build a life around them?

1. Stop choosing identities or titles. Choose intersections + values.

No single identity or title will ever fit you. That is fine. Generalists don’t need a single lane; they need an intersection where their skills naturally combine and reinforce each other.

Your real direction is the overlap of:

• what you can do

• what you enjoy doing

• what the world actually needs

• the values that make you choose one opportunity over another

Example for you:

Not “designer vs. content creator vs. teacher vs. globetrotter.”

The intersection is:

ideas communicated visually and globally, through design, media, and education, guided by values like mobility, clarity, accessibility, and meaning.

Identity clarity comes from intersections, not single labels.

2. Build hybrid projects, not long-term ladders

Generalists tend to burn out in long, single-track roles but excel when creating hybrid, time-bound, integrative projects.

These projects provide tangible evidence of your skills and attract opportunities.

Examples from my own life:

• design + storytelling
  My zines and magazines — the one format I will never shut up about because it feels like the inside of my brain printed.

• research + travel + content creation
  My “Different Way” project — exploration of nonlinear life paths across countries on social media.

• mental health + philosophy + teaching + content
  My video series, where I translate philosophical tools into practical frameworks for decision-making, relationships, and mood regulation.

• travel + design
  An international design apprenticeship I’ve done in Greece.

• teaching + philosophy
  The philosophy course I designed and taught from scratch in a private school in San Francisco.

• philosophy + design
  My philosophy-driven poster and collage series (post-structuralism meets visual communication).

• language teaching + design + social media

  My Russian language course. Product, platform, and media visibility were fully designed and executed by me.

• global opportunities + community building
  This Substack hub — a home for global-minded generalists.

• art + design + philosophy + global possibilities
  My undergraduate thesis — a video art, collage, and poetry project grounded in post-structuralist theory and language-as-structure.

Hybrid projects signal that you can operate across disciplines and deliver outcomes.

This creates demand faster than any static job title.

3. Rotate in your natural cycle

Most generalists are seasonal; otherwise, we would go insane by trying to work on all of our 20 passions at the same time. Different seasons of life have different priorities.

• each cycle teaches new skills

• each cycle expands your opportunity surface area

• each cycle opens a new network

• each cycle helps a different part of you grow

The architecture consists of one main project per cycle, one supporting skill, and one public output.

That is enough to grow your ecosystem without burning out.

4. Become discoverable on purpose

Generalists rely on visibility more than specialists because opportunities often emerge from connections, context, and curiosity, rather than linear applications.

Visibility does not mean “being an influencer,” but it does mean you need to become findable.

Practical visibility architecture (online):

• post consistently

• document process

• share opportunities you find

• write micro-essays to clarify your thinking

• publish small wins

Visibility makes luck predictable. If you are invisible, no one knows where to aim opportunities.

Let me know if you want to know how I am becoming this “Omnipresent Generalist” online :0

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5. Anchor your life in global opportunities first

As a weak passport holder, I view global life as a game of strategically capitalizing on opportunities that open borders.

I’m constantly hunting for:

• funded educational programs

• volunteering projects

• short-term seasonal work abroad

• cultural residencies

• scholarships (study, language, research)

• visa-friendly fellowships

• international volunteering

• hybrid online work

• freelancing opportunities

• online “lazy girl jobs”

These opportunities give you:

• networks

• future visas

• credibility

• global proof-of-work

• stories

• skills

• MONEY (capitalism dah)

Every opportunity you take expands the next set of options. For generalists, this is how you build a life that allows you to “live everywhere” and “do everything.”

The forward path

What I am learning now is that building a nonlinear life is not about choosing one career, one identity, or one country. It is about designing a life architecture that can hold all the versions of you without forcing you to amputate parts of yourself—a life where your curiosity is not a problem but the actual engine that moves everything forward.

What I want now is a career and a life that feel spacious enough for all my interests, not just one. Something that can grow with me as I move through different countries, different projects, different versions of myself.

And honestly, the more I talk about this publicly, the more I realize how many people have been quietly carrying the same discomfort—people who felt “wrong” for not wanting what they are supposed to want.

So this is the path forward for me: keep moving, keep experimenting, keep sharing, and keep building a community of people who see themselves in this.

I don’t have everything figured out, but I know that I am done trying to shrink. I want a nonlinear, seasonal, global life that allows me to utilize all my skills and live in all the places that feel like home. And if reading this made something inside you exhale, then you are exactly who I hoped would find this.

Welcome 🤍🌏

🫂 I’m building a space for people like us: the generalists, the multipassionate, the global citizens who don’t want to choose between all the things they’re good at. If this resonated with you, stay close.

Subscribe now

I’ll soon open 1:1 consultations for navigating scholarships, seasonal jobs, visas, and global opportunities, and I’m launching a weekly roundup of fully funded programs and meaningful ways to work, study, and live abroad.

This is the beginning of a Different Way — one designed for people who think broadly, live widely, and don’t fit into one box. If that’s you, I’m really happy you’re here 🙂‍↕️

After graduating from university this year, I wanted to follow the “normal” path: move to Europe, get a job, build a stable adult life. That was the plan, but because of a series of circumstances, it did not happen. And as my very fatalist Russian family loves to say, everything happens for a reason and for the best. I think they are right this time.

Because once the plan collapsed, I had to face something I had been avoiding for years: I do not actually like any of the careers I see around me. None of the obvious paths felt like an 80% match, and I am not even chasing perfection. I fully believe in Netflix’s Indian Matchmaking philosophy that an 80% match is already a miracle (Auntie Sima is always right). Yet, I could not even find that, because something was always off.

The frustrating part is that I have genuinely loved every path I have tried to pursue, and while most of my choices were driven by curiosity, nothing ever felt like an 80% match. I will explain why later.

So after my “normal” plan fell apart, I went back to where everything began: my Siberian village, a place where absolutely nothing happens. This makes it the perfect silent retreat by accident. Most days, I do not talk to anyone at all, and in that quiet, everything I had been mentally running from suddenly became very, very loud.

not a one-thing person

For months, I tortured myself trying to pick “the thing.” Academia or art? Content creation or travel? Something corporate or something creative? I was furious with myself for not being able to make one clean, adult decision.

Everyone kept telling me to niche down, pick a lane, choose one thing, and hammer at it until it cracks. And although I understand the logic and even agree with it in theory, my nature refuses to comply.

I have always been like this. I was a straight-A student because I genuinely liked most subjects, and I thrived in school partly because Russian schools force you to take more than twenty different classes every week. I jumped from interest to interest. In university, I chose philosophy because it talks about everything. We philosophers are nosy like that, and I love the meta level of philosophy, the bird’s-eye view of mental and material structures.

During my first year of university, I worked five jobs, partly because I needed to survive financially, and partly because that is simply who I am. I loved volunteering and project-based work. That is why I gravitated so naturally toward design, where every project is different.

The first time I felt real pain from being multi-passionate in a career context was when I tried to build a blog. I wanted to talk about everything, but all the “experts” insisted that I had to pick one passion. So I did, and within a few months, I became miserable because, inevitably, I wanted to talk about something else.

Every pivot felt like burying my old interest in the ground, declaring, “I do not do this anymore. New era now.” Then the old passion would return with full force, and I would feel ridiculous. Society saw me as flaky, and eventually, I began to see myself in the same light. Instead of embracing the natural seasons of my personality, I wasted a great deal of time being upset with myself, time that could have been spent building, experimenting, earning, and learning.

system designed for specialists

A large part of this struggle is not personal; it is structural. Our entire system is designed to make you feel wrong if you are not a specialist, because it is built on an industrial-era mindset of “one person, one role, one function.” Schools, universities, and governments continue to operate under this logic.

But the world has already moved past that, especially now that AI is fully here. We no longer need only specialists. We need dot-connectors and pattern-seers, as well as individuals who can utilize multiple tools and think in terms of ecosystems.

Yet institutions still cannot handle grey areas. They do not know what to do with someone who hops between fields, because they cannot categorize you. Banks are unsure of what to write in the occupation box on your forms. HR departments often struggle to understand portfolio careers.

My friends and family did not understand it either, and my many interests worried them. People around me equated variety with instability, and eventually, I internalized that belief and came to think I was unstable too.

guilt, depression, and the myth of “one true career”

My last year of university was actually one of the happiest periods of my life, and as I reflect on it now, it was precisely because I was doing many different things at once. I was teaching in multiple areas, researching philosophy, working on design projects, traveling whenever possible, and even indulging my love for animals by providing pet care. It might have looked chaotic from the outside, but to me it felt deeply right. I fully embraced it, although I still struggled when someone asked me what I did for a living.

Then I told myself I had to “grow up,” choose one thing, and stop playing.

And even before I started any full-time job, I fell into a depressive episode. It was not because I cannot do one thing for forty hours a week, because I absolutely can. I can become intensely hyper-fixated and completely absorbed for two or three months. What terrified me was the idea of doing the same thing for forty years. A part of me also wanted a nice title, something that would provide ego-satisfying clarity.

Back then, I did not have the language of seasons. I did not know it was okay to be a micro-expert for a few months and then shift. I did not realize it was normal for some people to dive deeply, emerge, and then dive deeply into something else. So my logic became painfully rigid: “If I cannot do this one thing forever, I should not even start.”

It was such flawed logic. I rejected entire opportunities because I knew I would not want to commit to them for decades. I did not allow myself to be seasonal or cyclical, nor did I let different passions take turns. Instead, I interpreted my natural three-month cycles as proof that I was incapable of doing anything at all.

The worst part was that I did not even have the vocabulary to understand myself. I was not familiar with terms like “multipotentialite” or “multi-passionate.” I only found articles describing people like me as “adult children” with “commitment issues,” so I labeled myself broken, immature, and flawed.

When you see a fundamental part of your personality as a problem, it becomes a problem. I quit things I loved abruptly and sadly because I kept thinking, “If I cannot do this forever, I should not do it at all.” That logic applied to every one of my interests. This is precisely why I could not find an 80% match for any job. The issue was not the jobs; it was the assumption that I had to marry one of them.

finding words for the life I actually want

Everything changed once I discovered new words for myself. This is why I am so drawn to post-structuralism and the philosophy of language. Language literally shapes how we understand ourselves.

Once I realized there were people like me, people who do not need one fixed identity and who naturally function in cycles and seasons, I suddenly felt less broken. Institutions might not understand us, visa forms might not have a box for “renaissance person doing six parallel projects,” and banks might still prefer one job title, but none of that means we are wrong.

I grow through exploration. I learn through projects. I move in cycles, and my priorities shift naturally depending on the season I am in. When I finally stopped forcing myself into one tiny box, everything about my life began to fall into place.

And what feels stupid, in retrospect, is how much time I wasted punishing myself for being who I am. Half a year after graduation, six whole months, I did nothing but spiral over the fact that I could not choose one thing. Imagine what I could have created during that time if I had not been busy hating myself.

new philosophy for the generalist era

Here is where I have finally arrived: I may never become a world expert in one micro-topic, but I can become an expert in multi-passionality, nonlinear life design, global opportunities, and building a portfolio career that actually feels interesting and alive.

I have already lived pieces of that life, and now I need to rebuild it intentionally.

And the world is shifting toward us. People fear AI, but it will weaken hyper-specialization. If machines can perform narrow tasks better than humans, the humans who thrive will be the ones who combine ideas, make decisions, move across fields, adapt, and connect the dots.

Generalists. Renaissance people. Not specialists.

different way forward

This brings me to social media, something I genuinely enjoy and do not want to give up. What I am giving up is forcing myself into niches that suffocate me. I want to speak openly about being multi-passionate while navigating it from the inside, not from some polished “after” version of myself.

What I want to build now is a life that actually fits the way my brain works. A nonlinear, seasonal, global life. And the more I speak to people like me, the more I realize how many of us are quietly struggling, feeling “wrong,” feeling “too much,” or feeling like we are malfunctioning simply because we don’t fit into the career templates.

So I am choosing a different template.

I am building my career around opportunities rather than job titles, around projects rather than permanence, and around curiosity rather than consistency for its own sake. And I want to document this entire process honestly: the scholarships, the temporary jobs, the visas, the rejections, the wins, the creative seasons, the side quests, the ways I make money, and the ways I keep reinventing myself without losing myself.

Because I know I am not the only one who needs this.