Stress. It comes in many forms and affects every aspect of our lives. From an early age we are imprinted that the more stressed you are, and the more responsibilities you take on, the more successful and accepted you will be. Someone just told me the other day that we stress as soon as we are born, it just changes over time. Finding someone to sit with at lunch in first grade is stressful, just like picking the right desk to sit at on your first day of high school. At the time, all of these things matter to us. Looking back, they seem small and unimportant, but back then it was a daunting experience. As you get older, the stress becomes different. From finding the right desk to sit at to finding an apartment and a job, we accept stress at a young age as something that we have to deal with for the rest of our lives. And to a point, that is true. But it doesn’t have to be! In this day and age, we, as college students, are taught that all-nighters are expected, and you have to be able to complete everything by unbelievable deadlines. In addition to all of the work that we are assigned, we are expected to stay in good shape so that we are attractive, do community service to prove that we are good people, and to have flourishing social lives. All of this in 24 hours! It is an unbelievable amount of stress to put on young adults.

I was raised with a bed time, healthy meals, and plenty of exercise each day. Those are the ideals that were instilled in me from a very young age, so I still hold true to them today. The only difference is that as a child, it is feasible to accomplish all of these things in addition to school work and free time. As we get older, it seems like we are given less time than as a child. But the reality is that we have taken on too much. Granted, there is a certain number of things that we have to do in order to survive and succeed at life, but many overdo it. I can say from experience that it is easy to get sucked into the idea that we all have to participate and succeed at the same things. College has taught me that the only thing we can rely on is change and diversity. No matter where you go in life, these two things will always stay the same.

The problem that comes with this, is that we don’t understand that we can still be successful without pushing ourselves past our limit. It is expected of us to take on more than we can handle, and still succeed. I recognize that it is vital for self-growth to push ourselves, and go out of our comfort zone. But the level that is placed on college students is unreasonable. Many adults tell us, “We all went through this and came out fine,” or, “Why are you complaining? You signed up for this.” But the fact is that the college and early adult life has changed drastically over the past five years. We are seen as a whining, and entitled generation. I agree, to a fault, that this is true. But we have our reasons.

I know from personal experience, and observation of others that the stress college places on its students has started to affect their health. I was recently diagnosed with shingles…at the age of 20! My doctor told me to stop stressing as much, and I literally laughed in his face. As a junior attending a small liberal arts college, my life consists of stress….with a side of stress. I am in class all day, rehearsal at night, after that I go to the gym, and do my homework. I have started to feel the stress of life after college. With what I want to do with my life, to breakdowns over whether I will graduate on time. There are multiple levels of stress in our lives. The everyday stresses of getting assignments done, and workouts in for the day. To the overarching stress that is always on the backburner in our minds. It is detrimental and unhealthy to place this much stress on our younger generation.

Here is the good news! We don’t have to accept all of this stress that is placed on us! Yes, we have to complete certain things to be active members of a society, but we can’t let it break us. These past two weeks have taught me to take a second to breathe, and accept the fact that things will happen no matter what we do. There are things we can change, and things we can’t. As simple as it seems, it is one of the hardest things to learn. We cannot change everything in life, but we DO have the ability to not let the stress affect us so much. We need to breathe, and rest! So whatever that means to you, go for a run, go eat your comfort food, or take a boxing class. Do whatever makes you happy, and shake off the things that you can’t change. College is exponentially more stressful, with higher expectations than it used to be. But we are strong. We have overcome so much in our lives, and will continue to do so until we have completed everything we have set out to do. There is no changing the way that college treats us, but we can change how we react to it. Stress may try to take over our lives, but we have to take a stand against it. I believe in you, and you should too. You are an incredible person and don't deserve to be driven down by stress and the unreasonable expectations that are placed on us. With that said, go and conquer all of those classes, and keep your head held high!