You're in the home stretch of your senior year. Everyone is getting separation anxiety and you're probably getting a little annoyed at being asked, "Have you decided on a school?" for the thousandth time. You might be thinking about how boring it is. You might be excited and a little bit nervous and maybe getting a tad nostalgic. I’m here to remind you that college is hard. It’s hard to be the only one responsible for making your schedule, getting to class on time, making extracurricular commitments, managing your time and basically running your own life.
It may sound like I'm stating the obvious, but knowing all of these things cognitively and living through them are two completely different things. So, my advice is to listen to the advice — even the advice you probably don't think you need.
1. Choosing a college.
This is easily the most important aspect of senior year. Forget AP exams and SATS (well, don’t actually forget them because you’ll need them to get into that dream school in the first place), and focus on this decision. Apply only to schools that you could genuinely see yourself being happy at. Trust your gut when it comes to visiting college campuses. Hint: If it takes more than three visits to a school to make you fall in love with it, then it’s likely it isn’t a good fit for you.
Don’t apply to a school because it’s everything you think you want and you should like it, because your parents like it, because it’s your best friend’s dream school, because you feel guilty for traveling to go on a college tour or any other reason that’s not really your own. Even if you end up applying to far fewer schools than your peers, it’s worth it to only apply to schools you are certain you will love because after you’ve spent months applying and perfecting your applications you’ll want reassurance that you’re going to be happy, regardless of your acceptances or rejections.
2. Nothing is guaranteed.
When you receive those letters in the mail, it’ll be a complicated stew of emotions that can leave you feeling ecstatic or depressed in a sentence or two. If you’re anything like me, knowing how hard you’ve worked throughout high school, how well you achieved and still receiving the news that you’re not considered a good fit for a specific school can be crushing and leave you wondering if everything you’ve defined yourself by was worth it.
On the other hand, receiving good news can be just as complicated when you have five acceptances on your hands and don’t know what to choose. Make a list of pros and cons. Spend some free time defining who you are, even if you know you won’t get very far because these are the things that will help you make the best decision you can. Your parents and friends can help you weigh the options, but ultimately, you have to make the decision by yourself. However, remember to keep in mind that while this is an important and expensive choice, it is not the most important decision of your life, nor is it irreversible. Take it seriously, but remember this isn’t life and death.
3. Saying goodbye doesn’t mean everything will change.
Don’t feel the need to cut all ties. I’ve always heard that you’ll come back from college to find your friends irreparably changed, but I don’t think that’s true. The things that matter are the things you’re going to come home to, so don’t cut yourself off by expecting to redefine your entire life, or assuming that going to college will mean a personality and popularity facelift and a complete severance from your old ties and old self.
Whether or not you think you will, you’re not going to be redefining yourself as much as you expect. As my mother wisely put it, “You take yourself with you” and that means your memories and experiences too. Spend time making memories and try not to spend all your time thinking about how great it’ll be to be on your own. Maybe rethink ending (or not ending) relationships and friendships. Visit your favorite haunts and take some snapshots of favorite activities and well-loved people. Take time to appreciate the things you’ll miss about home. You still have to come back, you know, so those fights with your parents and your closest friends are probably not as worth it as they seem. It's okay to hold your friends and family a little bit tighter and to pause for a moment and try to store those memories away for the future. Believe me, you'll need them.
4. Getting to college.
So, you’re in college now and regardless of what you expected, this is not what you expected. High school is limbo. When you’re in high school, you spend a lot of time sitting in class, waiting for your freedom and for the best years of your life. As I see it, there seems to be two schools of thought for high school students heading to college. The first sees college as an immense opportunity for freedom and fun and a time to be crazy. The second sees college as an extension of high school with hard work and a little freedom. High school is limbo because it’s a state you’re stuck in while waiting for college, a state that you might either enjoy or hate but regardless of your feelings about it, are stuck in.
The thing is, college is also limbo. College is a training ground for adulthood like high school is a training ground for college. So you’ll have to lower your expectations. I’m here to tell you it’s a lot of fun. But it’s not all a party. You’re going to have some best nights of our lives, but you’re also going to work harder than you ever have — and have times when you’ll be lonely, homesick and confused. It’s part of becoming an adult. My advice is to seize the opportunities. Be true to yourself but don’t be afraid to expand your horizons and try new experiences, because you’re just starting out. Try everything you want to try and make the best of your experience, regardless of how it’s going at the time.
Dear High School Seniors,
I’m writing to you because what you’re living is a part of life I’ve already lived. But I’m not only writing to you. These are lessons that take time and ones I’m still learning. The good part is we don’t have to decide everything right now. We’re still in training. It’s okay not to know. It’s okay not to know what we’re interested in majoring in, what career we want, or even where we want to go to school. It’s okay if we don’t pick the right schools, if we make mistakes, or if we’re just not having the time we expected to have. But regardless of how well we learn or don't learn our lessons, we ultimately are still going to live life, good choices and bad, from day-to-day. We can’t fast forward to other parts of our life. We can only work today to make our tomorrows even better.
So here’s my advice to you high school seniors and first-semester college freshman: don’t have these grandiose expectations for college. Don’t define yourself by your friends’ experiences, or even your own, because they won’t determine the overall experience of life. These might be the best years of your life, but they could also not be the best years. There might not even be best years because life is such that the bad and good are always going to be intertwined. You might think things couldn’t be worse or you might be firmly convinced that they couldn’t be better. Maybe you’re in a confusing state where both of those descriptions seem relevant. Regardless of how it's going, keep going. Maybe the "best years" started yesterday or maybe they are going to start tomorrow. Maybe you've been having them all along. But if you keep working at it, it’s going to get better than you ever thought it could.
We’re in limbo, afterall. To use a cliché, enjoy the ride.
