It's still summer, yes. But, this semester is creeping up very fast. You keep telling yourself that you should just focus on spending this summer doing things you love with the people you love. Except, it's hard to when the thought of next school year is lingering in the back of your mind the whole time. This is how I feel, and have felt since I only have less than a month of summer left.
It's weird to think that last summer at this time, I was getting ready for my first year of college. I was buying matching dorm room decorations, school supplies, and feeling totally psyched for the coming school year. I didn't know what it was going to be like. I didn't know what to expect. That's the difference between last summer and this summer. Last summer, I was worry free and ready for the journey of a lifetime: college. This summer, I already know what it's like. And frankly, it's scary and I'm not really looking forward to it.
Everyone says that it'll get easier after the first year. You'll get used to things like being away from home, having to do things on your own, and balancing all of your activities. But, just thinking about how to handle everything that will be thrown at me these next two semesters is sort of terrifying. And I love being home, surprisingly! So, I don't want to go back! After making it through the first year of college, and being home for the duration of summer, I don't know how I'm going to do it and I don't really know how other people do it. I now know what to expect from college and what everyone at college expects from me. And it's extremely hard. I now know that I'll have little to no free time and after having tons of it this summer, that totally stinks. I know that on top of difficult classes, I'll have to balance my extra-curricular's, which puts a lot of pressure on me and I don't know if I'm prepared for that. How in the heck am I supposed to spend time with the people I love if I won't have any time for myself? This year is going to be tough, and I'm not ready for that.
Now, people in the same boat as me are probably asking, is this normal? Is it normal to be completely terrified of going to college, even though you may have already gone through a year of it? And my answer to that is: I have no idea. No clue. It does seem that for other people, it all gets easier for them. They are used to it. They can handle it. So I'm starting to think this isn't normal. This feeling that is eating away our thoughts. But, we're going to have to find ways to deal with what we're worrying about.
We need to take it easy. Find free time and spend it to the fullest. It'll probably be hard, but it helps to make us think that we will be able to. We need to remember the people back home and even though you may not be able to spend time with them, they will be there when you go back on breaks. We also need to remember the people at college that are there for you and will do anything to help you. We need to be involved, but not to the point where we're tearing our hair out worrying about being here and there at the same time. Remember: you can always say no. We need to think of the future and how good going to college is for it. We need this education and experience to be successful. We need to stay focused and do everything to the best of our ability without getting stressed out.
The fact that college is scary and hard is not going to stop me from going. So, have fun the rest of the summer and don't think about what college may bring. We won't know until we get there and it all starts. Try to think of the positives instead of the negatives and what might happen. I should take my own advice, and so should you. Happy college-ing, everybody. It'll all be worth it in the end.
