Had someone asked me on my high school graduation night where I saw myself in 10 years, my answer would be simple. Married, maybe a kid or two, with a steady job that allowed me to make a decent living. While sticking to this path would probably make my life run more smoothly and put my parents at ease, I've learned that my happiness won't come from the simple life I once envisioned. If you asked my friend who has had her life planned since she was 6 what she thought about not having her future set in stone, I'm sure she would be repulsed by the idea of "what if". However, I think I speak for lots of college age students when I say that I by no means have my life together.

College is one of the only times in your life that it's okay to not have your life together. A lot of us are still in that awkward stage where we are no longer children, but we also aren't adults. We dread family functions or seeing family friends and the ever-present question of "what are your plans for the future?", a question that can be answered a variety of ways simply depending on the day. We're trying to discover ourselves and make decisions about what we will do in our future while trying to manage a mixture of school, alcohol, and freedom. We're put under so much pressure to not mess up, to graduate with a 4.0 in four years, get accepted to graduate school, and get out of school with a solid job. What we aren't told as college students though is that it's okay to not have it all figured out.

Not having a solid plan for the future isn't a bad thing. It allows us to explore not only our future career wise but also allows us to find ourselves. I've been told over and over again that in order to be successful in the future, I needed to have a passion for what I do. But, at 19 years old, how am I supposed to know what I'm passionate about? Coming into college, most of us have little life experience and any 'passion' we have is based off of what we think we know about different careers. Entering my freshman year, I pictured myself as a doctor based on nothing more than salary and the ability to say I had an MD. However, after interning in a doctor's office for a week, I realized that I would rather be anywhere besides in a clinic. While this revelation not only scared me and stressed me out, I have come to peace with the fact that I will never spend my days seeing patients. I've realized my passion doesn't lie in medicine or public health, but with travel, politics, and business.

Looking back at the person I was graduating high school, I am now a complete stranger to who I was a year ago. I've allowed myself to relax, to be free, and to discover myself. I've discovered that there's much more important things than having a relationship and instead began to allow myself to be open to new experiences. I've realized that a night out with your best friends is well worth the headache that will accompany you to class the next day, pizza is the best meal at any time of the day, and not to judge a beer by its price. To my parents' relief, I've finally settled on a major that allows me to pursue my love of travel and business while ensuring I'll always be able to find steady employment. While my world is still chaotic, for the first time I feel truly content with the direction my life is going.

So for those of you who don't have it together, go ahead and make mistakes, allow yourself to get hurt, and explore the opportunities that life is going to throw you. Enjoy your friends, drink cheap wine, and most of all make yourself happy. Say yes to adventure and no to familiarity. These are supposed to be 'the best years of our lives' so why waste it away stressing over every little detail?

While my life is nowhere near being perfectly planned, I revel in the fact that I'm finding myself in the hectic mess called life. But, until it is, I'll continue to dance the nights away with the girls who have become my best friends, laugh over Margaritas and Mexican, and enjoy every aspect of my messy life. So no, I don't have my life together, but at the end of the day, it's totally okay.