Starting from a young age, we are under the impression that life is an endless wild ride with too many possibilities to even fathom. While this is true, the biggest X factor in our lives is that we do not really know how long our “endless wild ride” is. If you are 20, you may feel like you have a good 80 years secured to carry out your future dreams, but the truth is that reality does not always cooperate with our plans. This does not mean to live life fearing that every joyous moment will be your last, but rather to slow down and appreciate the small moments that easily pass us by amongst the everyday chaos.
As a college student, there is bound to be some form of stress in your life, whether it stems from an exam, endless homework or a group project you can’t be bothered with. Add on extracurriculars and work, and you have probably found yourself wishing all of it to be over and for the next chapter to begin. These responsibilities are the basis of the college years that are supposed to be the best years of our lives. The stressful responsibilities are not what make this time in our lives exciting, but rather the memories we create. This is why you must make sure you actually enjoy yourself and spend time making these memories!
Over the course of my short 18 years of life, I have realized that we live in a rushed society. It seems that in every part of our lives we are just scrambling ahead to the next stage. In high school, it felt like everything I did was working towards getting accepted into college, and now that I am here, it feels like I am hurrying to find a passion to pursue for possibly the rest of my life. Although having goals, dreams and aspirations is vital for success, I think we all need a daily reminder to just stop for a moment and appreciate where we are in life. We should resit treating every stage as a transition while waiting for the next bigger and better part of life to come along.
One of the ways to start thoroughly enjoying every aspect of life starts with Carpe Diem — that is, enjoying the people and experiences around us. If you ask any older person to reflect on their life, oftentimes they will say they wished they had spent more time with friends and family, done the things that actually made them happy, tried new and exciting things, and experienced everything life had to offer. In the end, how much money, power and security someone accumulates is not a proper representation of how enjoyable their life was. While these factors can open up doors to new opportunities, the saying “money can’t buy happiness” often holds true. Power, status and money are all measurable commodities that feed into our materialistic desires as humans. With the limited days we have on earth, it is not reasonable to only focus on these qualities. The pursuit of these money metrics can easily consume us because we are taught from a young age that these qualities are what define a successful, happy person. At the end of the day, it is what we do in life, rather than our material possessions, that makes us happy.
When you are old and gray, you want to have stories that are bursting with laughter, adventure and lessons learned. Developing who you are as a person through life experiences is far more valuable than stressing over minor inconveniences that inevitably arise in life. I am not saying to go out and blow off every assignment and act like you do not have a care in the world, but rather invest in adventure, mistakes and the people we care about. We have to take risks, try new things, listen to our music too loudly and dance like no one is watching, because missing out on life should not be on our to do list.
If you would like to write for Her Campus Mount Holyoke, or if you have any questions or comments for us, please email mt-holyoke@hercampus.com