Sure, we can all agree that college is important because it's where we go to obtain an education for our selected future careers. However, what they don't tell you in those fancy, colorful "Why You Should Attend Our University" brochures is that you learn a lot more than just statistics and acid-base titration.
1. Keeping a schedule is hard.
Whether it's a sleep schedule, a study schedule, or even an eating schedule, there is always a high chance that something is going to mess up your timing. Life can be like that sometimes... but the key is adapting to the situation and accepting that not everything is going to go according to plan. It's probably one of the bigger, more important non-school life lessons you could learn on your own.
2. Any place is an ideal nap spot if you try hard enough.
No matter how many times I've fallen asleep in public (which has been an incredible amount of times), I have never felt any sort of shame. It's hard getting enough sleep at night, as aforementioned, let alone staying awake during the day to get all your work done, so life may call for a quick 20-minute snoozer in the middle of your dining hall. Sometimes, you just gotta do what you gotta do.
3. You need your parents a lot more than you'd like to believe.
I'm lucky enough to have amazing parents that went above and beyond to give me everything when they were raising me... kind of to the point that I was spoiled and didn't even have to do my own laundry when I lived at home. Going away for college showed me that, as badly as I wanted to grow up and become my own person, my parents were the ones that kept me functioning on a daily basis. Plus it's really hard being so far away from them for so long.
4. Friends really do come and go.
We'd all like to believe that the people we meet in college are the ones that we stay friends with after graduation. The fact of the matter is, as you go through college and learn more about yourself as a person, you realize that you're not as compatible with your friends as you may have initially believed. That's totally fine though! Aside from the whole "obtaining a degree for your future" thing, college is the time for most (if not all) of us to become who we meant to be in our adult lives, and that includes the type of people we interact with on the daily.
5. You have to be selfish every once in a while.
I know that it can be really hard to choose your mental health over a perfect score on a big exam, but taking care of yourself should always be Priority #1. Think of it this way: Good grades won't matter if you're dead! In all seriousness, I've learned that killing yourself over that A just isn't worth the physical, mental, and emotional toll.
In my four years of college, I guarantee I could not tell you what I learned in freshman year chemistry or my Intro to Asian American History class, but I will never forget these lessons.
