There is a scene in “The Little Mermaid” where Ariel is in an argument with her father. In exasperation, she yells, “I’m 16 years old! I’m not a child anymore!”

Despite her still being a child, she has a point. Ariel was doing something harmless that made her happy.

Her father, without any sort of understanding or to make any attempt to understand, lashed out at her. The reason why the scene is poignant is that she was right.

She had every right to seek happiness because that’s the point of life. You try to seek as much happiness as possible until you die.

I've learned that there are always people who get in the way of happiness.

When I started going to college, I kept saying to myself, “I am only 18. I can’t do this.” So I followed people.

I didn’t make choices because I wanted to make them, but because I wanted to please other people. I thought that if I was making other people happy, I could make myself happy as a result.

I can’t pinpoint the exact moment where I started thinking, “I am 18 years old. I’m not a child anymore. I can't keep on living life like I don't have my opinion." But thank God I did.

I wouldn’t be happy. I just wouldn’t.

I realize that I don’t rely on people as much as I used to. I don’t ask people for their opinion anymore because I realize that I simply don’t care.

For the first time, I’m thinking and acting in my own self-interest instead of focusing on someone else, and it’s great. It’s what I needed for the whole of my life but never had the ability to grasp.

I don’t give up this right as easily as I used to.

Like most of my other writings, I don’t have a point to this. I might look at this article a year from now and think that I’m some type of idiot, that I was leading this pseudo-adult life and was congratulating myself for nothing.

But, yet again, I don’t care.

I’m not a child anymore. I don’t have time to wallow about what mistakes I’m making because life is passing me by.

Because at the end of the day, I’m trying to become happier.