Instituto Ikigai has wrapped up its participation in Think Green, Click Smart, Act Digital, the Erasmus+ Youth Exchange project that brought together young people from Spain, Poland, Greece, Lithuania and Romania in Poland to reflect on sustainability, green skills, digital tools and youth participation.

Leading the Spanish group was Andrea, acting as team leader. It wasn’t Andrea’s first EU-funded exchange, but it was the first time Instituto Ikigai had given the opportunity to lead a group — and that difference, Andrea says, completely changed the way this experience was lived.

Leading Isn’t About Giving Orders, It’s About Making Room

For Andrea, coordinating the Spanish group wasn’t about issuing instructions, but about learning to read what each person needed:

“Being a team leader doesn’t mean giving orders or imposing your opinion over everyone else’s. Being a team leader means being ready to welcome everything those unfamiliar people had to offer, understand their needs, encourage dialogue, and keep the whole thing running even when something got stuck.”

That exercise in observation — knowing when to step in and when to step back — is, for Andrea, the most valuable thing to take from those days in Poland: truly learning to watch a group’s dynamics.

Living Interculturality, Not Just Talking About It

Alongside young people from Poland, Greece, Lithuania and Romania, Andrea discovered that talking about intercultural dialogue is far easier than actually living it:

“Living together means encountering different ways of communicating, joking, working and reacting to problems. It means constantly stepping outside your comfort zone and accepting that the way you see things isn’t necessarily the right one.”

Sometimes all it took was a conversation during a break, a shared dinner or a walk to learn something no scheduled activity could have taught, Andrea recalls about a few days in which a group of strangers ended up sharing routines, inside jokes and memories that felt like they belonged to a much longer time spent together.

An Experience That Carries On After Coming Home

Back in Spain, Andrea no longer felt there just to take something from the project, but also to help build a space where others could take part, make mistakes and enjoy themselves freely.

That is, precisely, the mark Instituto Ikigai aims to leave through every European project it takes part in: spaces where young people not only gain green and digital skills, but also grow as individuals and as leaders in their own communities.

Through testimonies like Andrea’s, Instituto Ikigai reaffirms its commitment to youth participation and to the Erasmus+ programme as a tool for learning, mobility and social impact. Anyone interested in joining future exchanges and being part of similar experiences can check upcoming calls in the Calls and Projects sections of the Instituto Ikigai website.