In five months, you’re going to gain your independence.

Some of you will move away; some of you will stay local, but all of you will branch off in some way; rushing toward new adventure with wide and glittering eyes. Enjoy your summer, because in August; you’ll finally understand why college students joke about dropping out.

In all seriousness, you’ll probably end up feeling like you want to quit, but you need to push past it. Nothing is more rewarding than realizing that you can actually survive, even when it feels like you can’t

With that being said, on May 27th of 2018, I will have been out of high school for exactly one year.

Everyone talks about how fast time goes by as a graduate, but you never really understand it until you experience it. I’m not going to stress about time management or the importance of reading your material, because yes; it’s important, but I will say this. . . your first semester will be a lot like high school in the fact that you get, in my experience, a lot of leniencies.

Don’t take advantage of this, but do use it to your advantage.

That might sound like a confusing statement, but a lot of freshmen professors will understand that the shift in work ethic and personal accountability is not only overwhelming but a learning curve. This doesn’t mean that you should slack off because the work is “easier,” because it’s not. This does mean that you should take the, oftentimes, extended deadline to do what you need to do ahead of the due date. This is something I regretted by the end of fall semester, and it’s something I will work toward fixing in the spring. If it seems that you have a lot of free time, you’re doing it wrong.

I will stress, however, that you don’t need your entire life figured out at age 18 or 19. Plan ahead, but understand and have the wisdom to know that plans change, and not everything follows a set path.

Instead, take the time to get your gen-ed courses and your extracurriculars out of the way. Find to out a little bit more about yourself. Figure out a new study habit that works for you, because if you’re not studying, why are you wasting your money? Search a new friend group, an essential to a healthy college life is a supportive and eclectic network of peers.

Branching out within a social circle is great for a) networking, and b) meeting individuals who can enrich your new chapter of life with their experiences and advice. I’ve been blessed with a close-knit group of individuals who not only have my back emotionally, but scholastically as well, and I can’t count the number of times that has come to my advantage during the fall semester.

Most importantly though, this time should be for enjoying your life as it is. A lot of people I’ve spoken to about college say that years 18 to 30 go by in a blur, and it just seems to get even faster after that. Get your work done, then go out and live a little. Like all things, there should be a balance to what you do, but don’t look back in 10 years with the regret of either partying too much or working too hard.

College is as amazing of an experience as you want it to be.