A shift to independence and new relationships
Being at home around your family, friends, teachers, coaches and others surrounding you whom you have known your whole life can be so normal in high school. That is something special that you get completely used to. Although, it doesn’t seem quite special at all, because you don’t realize what you have until it’s gone. You might know the name of every single person in your grade. You’ve had that one teacher for multiple years, and your parents are best friends with your coach or your principal. Every day you show up and see people you know whom you’ve known for years, maybe even your whole life.
After school, maybe you go to practice or to a club, and maybe those too are people you’ve known for years, and then back home at night to your parents. This might not be exactly how everyone’s days went in high school, but I think this time in your life is special, and you don’t realize just how much time you spend with people you love and get to see every single day. That is until you get to college and get some realization of what it’s like to not know everyone around you.
College is so very different from high school. We know this. Obviously there are pros and cons to not knowing every single person in your class, or even just going about your day not seeing a single person you know. But, in college if you don’t actively seek out spending time with others and being social, you might not see people for quite some time.
In college you have to put in an effort to see people whereas in high school it is much easier to just go about your day to day without making any effort at all to see the people you are close with and to spend time with them. Most likely you live with them- your family, or see them in school everyday and in after school activities.
Navigating relationships in college can be a difficult thing to do. They don’t just appear from days spent together in class and stay there with the people you go to school with for thirteen years. Or the people you grew up playing sports with, acting with, playing in the band with or any other activities. You may have had friendships due to your parents or siblings helping you out and providing that connection. You have to seek people out and get to know them separately from anyone else. This can be the most daunting thing about college for people, I think.
Feeling this way can cause loneliness but it is completely normal. I think that it is a part of growing. The recognition that this is a new time in your life that is no longer like high school, and that it’s okay to feel lonely sometimes. It’s okay to spend the day alone by yourself because ultimately you are growing into an independent adult. It’s hard to feel like when you want to make new friends or wish you knew more people it is all up to you, but that’s the challenge with college, this challenge makes you a stronger person and sets you up for success in the future.