Thank the teachers that pushed you.

You don't realize it right now, but the teachers who challenged you will remain engraved in the back of your mind even when you're an adult. They're the first ones to catch onto your true potential and push you towards it. Thank them the day you thought your life was over because you got a 77% on a biology test. Thank them the day they help you realize what your college major should be and when they tell you that there isn't anything they could see you doing other than that. Thank them randomly, and thank them often because if you wait until your last day of high school to express your gratitude, I promise you will regret it.

Make the memories.

Go to the football game, go to the dance, go to every event you can and have fun because it'll be over before you know and all you'll have left is memories- make them good ones.

Get to know the people you've spent the last 12 years with.

Soon, 99% of the people that you spend every day with will be a simple "hey, how are you?" at Walmart once a year. You'll try to keep up on Facebook but life will eventually get too busy. Be friends with everyone— ask the kid sitting alone at lunch to sit with you. Tell the shy girl that you like her outfit. Ask the boy sitting beside you in English what he wants to be when we graduate. Because someday, these cliques and groups won't matter, but the way you treated those people will remain with you forever.

Every single thing that you are worried about right now will not matter in three years.

I wish you wouldn't spend so much time worrying about your outfit or if people liked you. I wish you'd take the time and effort you spend worrying about the tests and your fights with your friends and spend it asking your parents about their day or asking what your brother is learning in school. I wish you'd realize then that you're not the only one getting older. Not one thing that you are stressed about will matter once you walk out of those doors at graduation.

Don't complain too much about your first job.

I know right now you don't think its fair that you have to spend your evenings working, but what you don't know yet is it'll give you the best years, friends, and memories of your life. It might just be your high school job, but someday you'll find yourself sick at the thought of having to leave the place that truly has become your home.

These are not the best years of your life.

I know you hear it all the time, high school is supposed to be the best four years of your life. But that's simply not true. I wish you could see the amount of happiness your college major gives you. I wish you could see who people that entered your life made you wonder how you ever survived without them. I wish you could see that no high school history test or SAT score can determine your worth as much as when you find yourself within your future career. I wish you could see the college friends, the fun things you'll do, and how proud you are of yourself. I wish you could see that even your best day in high school can't compare to where you're at right now.