As college students, we all know what it’s like to have crazy schedules and busy lives. I often find myself so consumed with the schoolwork I’m doing, the internship I’m working at, or my responsibilities as a member of my sorority’s executive board, that I find the moments I have to myself to just breathe are few and far between. Life is a hassle in this way. Sometimes life gets in the way of our ability to just enjoy ourselves and the people we surround ourselves with.

Through all the stress I have experienced during my first two years of college, I’ve learned that it’s not always possible to find time to do the things we love. I don’t always have time to sit in my bed and binge-watch Netflix for 10 hours. I don’t always have time to FaceTime my best friend from home and catch up on our lives for an entire night like I would like to. And I definitely don’t always have the time (or finances) to go on weekend getaways and mini-vacations to tropical places like I’d so love to. But most of us can’t do these things all the time.

Because of this, I have learned the importance of falling in love with the little things in my life. I’ve learned to find joy and pleasure in the simplest of things and it’s made a world of a difference on both my mental sanity and my happiness. I think it’s so important to not take for granted the little things that make us happy when we’re so wrapped up in the stress of our everyday lives. I encourage you all to find your own little things that make you happy and embrace them, or take a few of mine and put them in your pocket.

1. Waking up early and drinking coffee on the porch

2. The feeling you have when you walk out of the gym

3. Clean sheets

4. Putting on warm clothes fresh out of the dryer

5. Waking up before your alarm goes off and being able to go back to sleep

6. When someone laughs with me

7. When someone makes me laugh

8. When they have Italian Wedding soup in Redifer

9. Paying for the person-behind-you’s Starbucks order

10. Falling asleep when it’s raining outside

11. Taking off my bra at the end of the day

12. Finding something cute in the sale rack at Urban Outfitters

13. When your winged eyeliner is equal on the first try

14. When my mom sends me pictures of my dogs

15. Talking to someone you haven’t talked to in a while

16. When a boy holds the door for you

17. The first scoop out of a new jar of peanut butter

18. When the song you wanted to hear comes on shuffle without you picking it

19. Unexpected compliments

20. Sitting in bed in your towel after a shower and doing nothing

21. The smell of dinner/cookies/banana bread being made in your kitchen

22. Finding money in your pocket

23. When a professor makes your quiz a take-home quiz

24. Going out for a nice dinner

25. Every time Drake releases a new song

26. Penn State football (had to do it)

27. That stretch you do first thing in the morning

28. Long hugs

29. Candles

30. Being surrounded by friends and family