This week I was going to write something about the best Discovery Kids shows (think Endurance, Trading Spaces: Boys vs. Girls, Flight 21 Down). They were all so good! But alas I have something else on my mind, something I have just recently decided to call the “Davidson Olympics” (props to another HC writer, Katie Walsh for inspiring this title). The Davidson Olympics are the competitions among friends, acquaintances, and strangers about the amount of stress and work we are currently dealing with. I am guilty of it, and I bet you are guilty of it.
I know I am not saying something you don’t already know; I know I am not ranting about something that is not already ranted about. But sometimes I forget how ingrained in our campus culture it is because I have grown so used to using it to my advantage, to build me up, and give me energy, instead of tearing me down. But neither situation is healthy.
I was reminded of how this all felt my first year here (way back in the grand ole days of 2013) when I started editing some of the first-year HC writer’s articles. Fresh to campus, they quickly picked up on workload competitiveness that upperclassmen acknowledge as fact. These recently published pieces by freshman and upperclassmen alike say it all: SpongeBob, destress, insomnia. They are already developing coping strategies and learning how they can navigate Davidson life. They are competing in a decathlon, getting really involved in a lot of different things and experimenting. They have trained so long for this moment: college! But nothing could have prepared them for all of the hoops they are trying to jump through. The lack of preparation is ok, but the self and community imposed guilt you might feel by not having all of your shit together is not.
As senior with a little more than a semester left, I feel like a seasoned competitor that is looking forward to their final games. I know where I need to expend my energy to be successful. I know what and who matter to me. I know what brings me happiness, despite not really knowing where I am going post-grad (real talk: if you know anyone in the Bay area please let me know, thanks). But it certainly was not an easy road to get here, and it is not a chapter I can say is completely closed.
But while I may have once been sucked into that spiral of “who has more work,” I refuse to let some material object that someone else is evaluating be how I define myself. I am so much more than my performance in the classroom, and to be honest I am enjoying myself more outside of it, finding satisfaction in the work I do for different organizations on campus. I expend my energy where I feel it deserves to go, and only I determine that value.
To all the first years out there, this is not preaching. This is not a lesson, because I could say this over and over and this problem would persist. This is simply me saying that I hope by the time you reach your final year at Davidson that you know what matters to you here. I hope you expend your time and energy on things that challenge you but also build you up, things that might seem scary, but allow you to learn more about yourself.
Sending love, compassion, and Simone Biles vibes,
A classmate
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