1. Don’t have too many expectations.

I’m the type of person who has planned my entire college experience from the time I was in elementary school, so I thought I knew exactly what to expect. I’ve spent years watching films about the college experience, reading books with older characters, telling myself that someday I would live a similar lifestyle. I came to college with a perfect mental-picture of what my first few weeks would be like and I was unwilling to sacrifice any aspect of the dream.

Well, let’s just say that college, at least these first few weeks of it, is nothing like that ideal, which I now realize was more of a fantasy than anything else. That being said, college is an incredible experience that I’m sure will be even better than the version I had previously imagined. And going in with little to no expectations means that everything can be a surprise (hopefully good ones!)

2. Your perfectly-planned schedule WILL change. And it’s okay.

At Barnard, we did our course registration online back in June, before school had even started. This was both a blessing and a curse, because I was able to register for whatever courses I wished to take, however I wasn’t able to meet with an adviser beforehand to make sure it all looked okay. I spent hours laboring over my schedule; finally, it was perfect. Then I got to campus and everything fell apart.

What I wasn’t aware of before was that even though I might have appeared to be registered for a class, there was no guarantee that I wouldn’t still get wait-listed. So when half my classes turned from registered to wait-listed, you can imagine my frustration. In college, there’s no guarantee that you’ll get off a waitlist, and sometimes the stress of waiting to hear about classes that you may not ever end up getting credit for is worse than just dropping the class and moving on.

3. Don’t be afraid to try new classes.

Going off of the previous point, if a class doesn’t look like it’s going to work out, take advantage of the shopping period and try out something new. I had a few classes I was absolutely in love with that just weren’t working with my schedule, so I had to drop them and shop some new ones. Now, I’m registered for classes without wait-lists that sound incredibly interesting, classes I’m wildly excited to take. And my schedule is much more well-planned than before, allowing me more breaks throughout my day, thus ensuring less stress.

4. Be willing to go places alone!

If your school is like mine, they likely have some kind of orientation program for incoming students before classes start. During this time, the school or orientation committee usually puts on tons of fun events that are a great way to meet people. But, if you went to a different school than all of your friends, you likely don’t know a lot of people besides your roommate, and oftentimes, going to things alone can be very intimidating. There’s lots of events that I thought sounded really cool that I was hesitant to go to because I didn’t want to be the only one without a friend there. Nevertheless, college is a great time to try some things out of your comfort zone, so I went, and ended up meeting lots of new people with similar interests to mine. If your friends don’t want to go somewhere that you do, go! Chances are you’ll meet other people who like the same things and make some new friends that way.

5. It’s okay not to be doing something all of the time.

I’ve never been the type of person to suffer from FOMO (the fear of missing out). That is, until I got to college. In high school, I was perfectly content to come home at night and take a shower and finish homework, saving going out for the weekends. Going out on Fridays or Saturdays was plenty for me; I loved laying in bed and watching netflix. But with college comes being surrounded by people all the time, and trust me, people are always doing things. Especially living in New York City, there’s alway something going on, or somewhere to be, but let’s be real. Not everyone is the type of person that can sit in class all day, go out all night, and be totally fine. If you come back from a long day of classes and all you want to do is collapse into bed with a bag of chips, no shame. College can be really overwhelming and feeling like you constantly have to be going at the same pace as everyone else is not only physically draining, but mentally as well.