College is a hard, weird time of life where people are thrust from the safe comfort of home and all things familiar into the new and the stressful. In short college is the place where are trying to learn who we are and what we’ll do for the next couple of years at the least. The first couple of semesters are usually filled with excitement, joy and wonder. You’re still riding the wave of high school guidance counselors promises and all the wonderful things the college brochure showed you glossy pictures of. Then it starts, your basic classes are over now you need to figure out what to do for your major, for your job, and for money, you know easy questions. Here comes the stress, the doubt, the worry, and, my personal favorite, the existential crisis. Between planning out classes and running to job fairs you start to get the feeling that all of this future business needs to be figured out now. Well, my dear readers, I am here to tell you that this is all normal, you’re not alone and even better you don’t need to know it all. Here’s three easy things to remember when you feel like dropping out and joining the circus. Oh, that’s just me, okay.
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Everyone is going through the same feeling.
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The first thing to know is that nearly everyone in college is feeling the same as you. If you go to the library, and look to the left and then to the right all those people are going through the same existential problems. I go through it all the time. It’s normal. We’re all in college facing hard questions and are constantly being bombarded with stress and deadlines. A sleepless night of homework and social drama is breakdown inducing. Ask anyone on a college campus if their “fine” and there’s a twenty percent chance they might snap then and there, this number triples during any exam period. That is my very highly scientific finding. The best thing I’ve found to do when the sweet grip of panic comes in is just to take some deep breaths and go collect yourself for a minute, it helps to think with a clear head. And remember, you’re not alone. There isn’t anything wrong with you and you certainly are not the only person going through college a little bit lost like an unaccompanied Sim.
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Life is random.
What I’ve learned from people older and wiser than me is that life is not clean and straightforward like the Life board game. It’s more of a mix between Monopoly, Yahtzee, Sorry and oh yeah, Jumanji.
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By this, I mean that life is long, fun, hard and completely random. Anything can happen at anytime and big changes are a roll of the dice away. You can major in one thing, end up working in a job that has nothing to do with it and then change it all again because you got a better offer. Nothing is certain, the best thing I’ve been advised to do is follow what you know you love to do and/or good at. Life is long, so odds are that where we are now is definitely not where we’ll be tomorrow much less sometime in the next decade or so. No one has any idea what the future will look like, it’s impossible, so neither should you. Just work hard and prepare for anything. Oh and try not to land on those weird dart shooting flowers, those things are nightmare inducing.
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You are stronger than you know.
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This is the final and most important part, believing in yourself. It’s cheesy but true. Life is unpredictable, college is stressful but the one thing you can always count on is who you are. Work hard, stay positive and follow your gut and the advice of people you trust and things work out fine, I’ve been told. Maybe it won’t be great all the time but chasing a life that you want to live is apart of living.
So sure things may take an unexpected turn here and there, we may fall down on our luck at times and college is a minefield of drama, stress and emotional instability. But the occasional breakdown and the constant wondering of what you want to do and where you’ll end up in the future is not out of the norm. However, this is not cause for fear. It’s normal, life is long and unpredictable and the most important weapon to shield yourself from all of the doubt is the confidence you have in yourself.