Sometime last semester I was having a conversation with a classmate, we'll call him Declan. We were having a conversation, I suppose about me because Declan had said to me "I like you. You're funny, and you're smart, even though you talk too much."

Now, I know Declan's ultimate goal was not to hurt my feelings, yet it still felt a little bit like a back-handed compliment, telling me how great I am before deciding to point out a flaw of mine. I know I talk too much. Not only that, I talk too fast. If I'm having a conversation with someone, it's likely they won't even be able to understand all of the words that I'm saying if my mouth is going a million miles an hour. In another conversation with the same person, I was told that I'm not a good communicator because I interrupt people. Again, I know this. I don't need to have my social flaws pointed out to me because I know them, and I am working on them. Having someone tell me what I already know just cements the shame I feel for being this way.

However, now that it's 2017, and I have had three long, blissful weeks away from the hectic jungle that is college life, I have come to a conclusion about my social flaws: I don't care. Okay, scratch that, I do care, but not in an Earth-shattering way. My life is no longer going to be bent on what people think of my flaws. If I make a mistake, I make a mistake. Someone will point it out to me and I will try to fix it.

This isn't so much of a "New Year, New Me" mantra so much as it is "New Year, Same Me". I'm going to spend this year embracing me. It may sound narcissistic, but I love me. I love that I have finally come to love that I am nerdy, I am weird, I talk too much, too fast. I will no longer allow anyone to passive-aggressively tell me how they perceive me. No one should. The world is too big and life is too short for us to be worried about the trivial things that people think about us.

The way I see it, after the disaster that was 2016 that we left behind, 2017 should be a fresh start. A line from one of my favorite books, Fangirl, says "start as you mean to go on", and I think that is going to be my motto for January, as well as the rest of 2017. I am going to start 2017 as myself, and take time to love myself and focus on what makes me special. I'm not going to worry about what classmate Declan thinks, but he has given me a lot to think about. It was our conversation that made me realize that I don't really need to apologize for being me, I don't need to treat my faults as negative, and I definitely should not let others do that. No one should. My advice to you for 2017 is to love yourself. You are your most important supporter.