Dear fifteen year old me,
Everyone makes it sound like high school is a drastic change from middle school. But it’s really not. The biggest change won’t have anything to do with the new environment you will be thrown into. It will be you. The biggest changes you will experience in high school will be within yourself.
In middle school your awkward years are categorized by the changes to your body physically. Your body may be done changing, but mentally and emotionally, you’re not even close to being done. That is what the awkward years in high school are for. It's time for your brain to catch up. During high school, you and everyone else around you are trying to figure out who they are and who they want to be. It’s a time to explore, to try new things, and to figure out what you love and what you hate, the things you’re passionate about, the things that are important to you. It’s a time for you to get to know yourself again after spending 4 years in middle school trying to navigate all the changes your body experienced.
You're going to think you have to have everything figured out by the end of high school because that's what people will tell you. They will tell you that you should have a plan. You should know what college you are going to go to, what you are going to major in, what your future career will be, everything. To make it worse, some people will have their lives planned out by the time they graduate. That’s okay. Good for them. But that doesn't mean you have to. It doesn't mean you are behind either. The truth is that many people don't have their lives planned out by the end of high school. It’s actually normal and completely okay.
They won't give you a guidebook to navigate the craziness of growing up and entering the “real world.” You have to figure it out for yourself, just like everyone else. That’s what makes high school so hard. Everyone is trying to learn who they are and how that person fits in with everyone else. It's what makes the bad things that happen feel like the end of the world. I promise you, whatever happens, it’s not. It’s just high school. It won’t last forever. All those things that are so important right now won’t matter five years from now. What matters is that you remember the lessons you learn.
It's your life to live. Your journey to take. It won't look like anyone else's because it isn't supposed to. You'll laugh and you'll cry. Sometimes you'll get it right and sometimes you'll make mistakes. That's what growing up is for. It's not going to be perfect. You're not going to be perfect. That's okay. Just keep going.
Sincerely,
Someone older and wiser, because of the lessons life has taught her
