If I look back at any major glow ups in my life, I can contribute them to when I went through the biggest changes. Not just physical glow ups, but emotional ones. Career glow ups. Relationship glow ups. The biggest changes in myself are when I've had to go through the worst things. I wish it was easier, but at least this gives pain a purpose. As the semester comes to a close, I look back on the biggest change I've ever undertaken in a 4 month period: transferring to the University of Oklahoma.
It's not that transferring is the biggest change I've ever really dealt with. There are more traumatic things to happen to a person, but for me, this move kind of was, at least in 2018. I've moved more times in my life then I feel like counting right now, but this one caught up to me in a way that I wasn't ready for. It was like all the change I've had in my life caught up to me. I had to realize that it sucked, that I was home but still homesick. And I had to hustle to make my original home, my new home. The result is a canvas for making things possible that I know could have never happened back ~home~ in Edwardsville. Here's the progression of how I flipped my pain into passion, and a broken heart into my latest life glow up.
TBH, It Sucked
Yes, I was with my family. Yes, I was an hour away from half of the rest of my immediate family that I usually only got to see two times a year. Yes, I was at an even bigger, better University for my major in executive technology. But it was still change, and I didn't know it until it happened, but I was exhausted from it. I hit that kind of pain I've only ever really heard of before, the kind where I didn't feel like hustling anymore. But I made myself hustle anyway. My previous school taught me how to grind and get involved, and I left as an alumna of a sorority and an undergraduate researcher in robotics with one of the University Deans. I knew what it took to get to that level of involved: work. I told myself that even under the circumstances had to make sure to keep doing that.
I was home, but still home sick
College becomes home, and college becomes family. I definitely had a case of not knowing what you had until it was gone. To be real, I still miss my sorority so much it's crazy. I miss my best friends from SIUE and I miss St. Louis. A lot. And realizing that was the worst pain ever. Probably a combination of FOMO of St. Louis party buses, but also of the relationships that would have continued to grow if I would have stayed. Yes, the University of Oklahoma had so much more to offer me, but the heart wants what it wants. I fell in hardcore love with St. Louis, and I just wished I could be two places at once.
nevertheless, she still hustled
I went to networking parties with AT&T, Shell, and big Oklahoma tech companies. I finished 100% and more of my required training that the rest of OU students are trying to fit in now before finals are over, in just a few weeks of the start of the semester. I didn't want to keep pushing but at least now I know that even when I don't feel like doing something, I'm pretty damn good at doing it. I knew that I had to use everything I learned at SIUE at this bigger, badder, university, and I think in one semester I've pretty much made it my b****. I took every opportunity and lost some but won a lot. I'm on green week committee, work with special needs young adults, have an internship in the city, and honestly so much more, because I kept pushing even when it sucked, and even when I got rejected.
Serendipity saves lives
Although one part of my success here at OU is hustle, another is serendipity. I truly believe that when you're working hard, opportunities come your way that end up feeling like magic. One day walking back to my car after class I saw an organization's tailgate in the parking lot that I decided to look up on social media, and now the girls I saw tailgating are my support group. One day in one of my training sessions I starting talking to this super sweet Aphi would also happened to be an executive for Best Buddies that was meeting the next day, and now I get to hang out with the sweetest people with special abilities. I've met people who went to my original high school, in Colorado Springs, and people who've been to Mascoutah which is like 30 minutes from my old college. I've met people who are from the city I was born in, which is an hour from here, and who freak out when I tell them all the family stories about Blake Shelton. I can't think of any other university that could mean so much to me than OU, who's deeply rooted in my family history, but also has given me so much kindness and opportunity than I've ever experienced in my life. I'll always be grateful for everything my old school taught me and the family I have there, but OU has truly been my home away from ~home~. Even though it's my original home in the first place.
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