I’d consider myself to be a relatively strong person. I mean, I’ve been dealt cards in life that have allowed me to grow as a person and be better off, no matter how hard it may have been at the time. No matter how strong I am, it took me a lot to realize that I am not necessarily as independent as I would like to be. While coming to college certainly helped me to become more independent and self-sufficient, it took a lot for me to realize that I’m not where I want to be. But that’s okay.

For most of my life, I’ve leaned on and heavily relied upon the people closest to me. I find it very easy to form an emotional attachment to people who reciprocate the love that I give them, because that reciprocity isn’t always so easy to find. In some ways, I feel that the ease I felt in my attachment to others almost held me back, simply because I relied upon them so wholly and completely, so soon into a lot of relationships.

Going to college has changed a lot of that. While you don’t lose all of your friends when you go away to school, there is definitely a lot more distance than there was when you were all in high school together, in the same building. That’s completely normal and okay, and it’s something that I’ve learned to come to terms with (no matter how much I insisted I knew it was going to happen and that I would be okay with it before graduation came).

At the beginning of last year, I was afraid to lose those close to me. I was constantly worried that because we weren’t talking as much, that meant our friendship had diminished. Obviously, that’s not true. Relationships just take more work when you don’t see one another every single day. Friendships can be dragged through the mud and still last. It’s all up to whether or not you’re willing to put in the work; and honestly, with the friends I’ve stayed in contact with, I’m confident that I’m willing to put the work in every single day to maintain my relationship with these wonderful people.

What’s different now is that I’m not scared. I’m not worried that I’m losing my friends because we don’t talk every day, because I’m confident that I don’t need to be quite as dependent for my life to be okay. And that’s honestly such a liberating feeling. I love every second of it, of feeling as though I am enough. I love all of my friends, but I know that life is crazy and in a lot of cases friendship is fleeting. If I were to grow distant from any of my friends at this point, I would be okay with the distance and not freak out that I couldn’t rely on them as much, or feel as though I was losing a crutch.

That’s the difference between me now and me a year ago. I’ve grown a lot as a person, and I’m learning to be happy by myself and not rely on the people in my life quite as much. While I still love my friends and family (and will go to them for anything that I need), I’m also teaching myself for the first time how to rely on myself and not feel quite so alone when relationships get rocky or we get busy and can’t keep in contact as much. It’s part of the process of teaching self-love, and knowing that I can get through this crazy thing called life on my own, even though I know I’ll never have to.