College. When most people reflect on the four year experience, they tell you it is one of the greatest times in your life; it is essentially the last chapter of life where adolescent liberty remains, and your only responsibility is yourself. What they neglect to mention, however, is that it is also one of the most confusing times in your life. As it turns out, the self and all of the soul searching, and the identity developing processes buried within it, are quite the heavy burden.
Your parents have one expectation of you, your friends have another, and sometimes you spend so much time trying to make everyone happy that you lose sight of what actually makes you happy. So ask yourself, what does make you happy? This may be one of the most difficult answers to uncover. You may find that your desires are so far buried beneath what you think other people want- your friends, your parents, your significant other, your professors, your coach- that you don't even really know what they are, or what your motivation is for doing something. And so, if you find yourself wallowing in the depths of your uncertainty, or insecurity, as I have found myself, the most important thing to understand is that you can't please everyone, and if you try to please everyone, you end up making more people unhappy.
As someone who's had a great deal of trouble grappling with this reality, here's one of the best pieces of advice I can offer you: learn how to prioritize. When people used to tell me this, I'd roll my eyes, irritated, and say, "What the hell does that mean?" While I'm still largely in the dark, I've come learn that prioritizing is about looking within and without, about translating the moment into the big picture. It's about focusing on school and studying, athletics and training, and often times choosing to do what will help you achieve what you want to achieve in the long run over what might tempt you in the moment. But the trick is, often times doesn't mean all the time.
Sometimes, in our overly busy lives, we forget the importance of fun and having a social life. However, if you continually neglect the fun aspect of life, that aspect which encompasses time with friends, family and everything non-work related, you'll find yourself haunted by remorse. You'll find yourself saying, "Man I wish I'd just relaxed a little bit, and procrastinated writing that paper, or studying for that exam so I could've spent the night gossiping about stupid Yik Yaks, or having late night oldies jam sessions with my friends." In this way, you will hopefully come to realize that part of the whole idea of prioritizing includes making time for fun, and the people in your life. Because the bottom line is, if you don't make time for people, eventually they will stop making time for you, and that is just about the most awful epiphany to have.
Prioritizing is not only about looking at the big picture; it's about boiling the big picture down to the moment. Ask yourself, is that workout or that reading assignment worth missing a night out with my friends? Many times, the answer may be yes, but it shouldn't always be yes. If you find yourself unable to fit in times for social spontaneity because of an overloaded schedule, or an untamable sense of motivation, however, then what you need to do is schedule your time. Make plans with your friends to get dinner, or go to a movie over the weekend, or maybe decide in advance that you're going to skip a workout to do something fun with them. In these moments, when you may feel guilt or stress upon deciding to do something fun instead of something goal-oriented, remember that social experiences play an equally important role, if not a more important one, in the big picture. For many of us, learning to relax is one of the greatest lessons we can teach ourselves.
