It feels absolutely absurd to acknowledge the fact that I've completed my second last week of my LiA. The workshop I have been building from day one is happening in two days, the end of the internship is in four days, and the week itself demanded full presence in the way that only the most important stretches tend to. There was no room for nostalgia this week!! Frankly, still so much to do; so I put my phone down properly and deliberately and got on with it. 

What went well

Imposter syndrome, meet the registration numbers.

All speakers confirmed, the agenda is finalized, and the logistics are being worked through carefully alongside my colleagues to make sure the day runs as smoothly as it possibly can. The registrations, meanwhile, have well exceeded anything I had allowed myself to expect, and they continue to roll in. I want to be honest about what that means to me, because imposter syndrome has been a low and persistent presence throughout this internship, making me question sometimes whether the work is actually good enough, whether the people signing up genuinely want to, and whether I was really the right person to have designed an initiative like this. The overwhelming turnout has been addressing those queries steadily, and I am learning to let evidence do what anxiety cannot and simply trust what is in front of me. 

What makes the anticipation feel weightier rather than lighter is the nature of the audience itself. These are researchers, patient advocates, doctors, industry professionals, who have all carved time out of their demanding schedules because they believe the workshop has something to offer them, and that's something I don't take lightly. The logistical preparation this week has been driven entirely by a desire to make sure the experience is worth every minute they have committed to it. I have never led something for an audience quite like this one, and I feel the significance of that in a way that is more motivating than it is intimidating; at least most of the time.

On a personal note

An escape room, a heatwave, and feeling like a team.

Woven into the week was a team strategy day that turned into one of my favourite days of the whole internship. We did team building exercises together, worked through the kind of collaborative thinking that definitely does not surface on your average workday, and then collectively escaped an escape room, which felt like a confirmation of what this team is capable of when it pulls in a unified direction. All of this in the middle of a European heatwave, which we navigated with good air conditioning and chilled beverages. We went out for drinks afterward, and I found myself sitting with my colleagues who have been my only real community in Brussels and feeling quite grateful for the bonds I've strengthened with them over the course of my internship. 

The contrast of getting to know your colleagues in and out of the office was palpable: the dynamic shifts in a way that is hard to articulate but immediately felt. I came away from that day feeling closer to this team than I have at any point since I arrived, which is a significant thing to say in a penultimate week, but it's true. 

Personal note, continued

Touching grass, literally and figuratively.

In the early weeks of this internship, the idea of a digital detox would have felt genuinely untenable. My phone was the thread connecting me to everyone I love, the only proof on some evenings that I existed to people outside Brussels, and virtual interaction was not supplementary to my social life so much as it was the entirety of it. I held onto those ties because I needed it, and in hindsight I don't regret it because it kept me grounded.

But this week I let it go, and what surprised me most was not that I missed it at moments, because I did, but how quickly the absence made space for a sharper awareness of where I was, what was happening around me, and how much had genuinely changed since those first evenings alone. The photographs have not stopped, for the record; there is an album accumulating that I cannot wait to share with my friends when I get home. What has quieted is the compulsion to outsource my phone for connection, because the connections are here now, present and solid enough that I no longer need my phone to feel them.

What I learned

On being present, and being prepared.

I came into this internship with skills and passion and a genuine belief in the work, but belief on its own is not the same as confidence, and I think I have been confusing the two. Confidence, I am learning, is what accumulates when you have enough proof that the belief was warranted all along. The confirmed speakers, the finalized agenda, and the continued registrations are all proof of competence, and I am trying to receive them as such rather than immediately scanning for the catch.

The digital detox taught me something parallel: that presence is a choice, not a byproduct of good circumstances. I chose it this week, and Brussels gave me a lot in return. I am glad I waited until I was genuinely ready to make that choice, and equally glad that I finally was.

Looking ahead

Everything since May 21st has been building toward next week, and I am as ready as I'll ever be. I also miss home more than I expected to at this stage, which I think just means this experience has been full enough to make leaving feel like something. One more week!!