As a college student, I always love being on campus and going on spontaneous adventures with my friends. There’s just something about being able to have a random get-together on a Tuesday evening or deciding at 2 a.m. that you’re going to take a trip to Waffle House. As freeing as that might be, I still can’t help but think that I am missing out.
I have a niece who just turned four weeks old, my little brother has just entered his rebellious pre-teen era, my friends are starting their families, and my family has been hit with life-altering event after life-altering event. Being on campus, although only two hours away, has been difficult because keeping in touch with my home life has been reduced to keeping up with Instagram, group chats, and Facetime. My freshman year was no different, but my emotions have only exacerbated since becoming a second-semester junior. The excitement of the off-campus apartment has died down and reality has hit full force: You can not be everyone everywhere all at once.
Being on campus is like being in an entirely different universe at times. There’s the LockDown Browser test in that one class you struggle with due today, a Her Campus article due tomorrow, and a host of other collegiate responsibilities that we don’t have time to get into. Inevitably, I’ve become disconnected from life as I knew it to be before my first semester of college.
I find myself being envious of the life I left behind when I decided to leave my home state for school. I don’t regret going to college, but at the same time, I do regret missing out on those moments that I otherwise would have been witness to. This is the part of college that no one prepared me for. They always said it would be the best four years of my life and that it would go by in the blink of an eye.
What they failed to reveal was that being a college student constantly feels like being torn between two worlds; being forced to surrender to the one you spend the most time in, and the emotional turmoil that comes with the pressure of struggling to exist in two worlds at once being anything but fleeting. Two semesters, 16 weeks each, and you don’t have to be the brightest to realize that school wins that battle. They also never explained that no matter how much you miss home, it still has a way of feeling smaller each time you visit. Until one day, you realize that home no longer feels like home at all.
So how does one coexist between two worlds? I asked my friend this exact question and her response has been hard to accept. Two simple words that somehow left me more confused than before I asked the question. How does one coexist between two worlds?
“You don’t.”
We as humans cannot multitask so we have to choose where we want to be, what we want to do, and who we want to do it with. As a college student who currently feels stuck, I now know that it is not school or my home that makes me feel this way. The real dilemma lies in understanding that who I was is not who I am now and that I don’t necessarily have to pick a side.
The beauty of life is that we get to make choices. To coexist between Hometown You and Campus You, you have to make choices. Spring break doesn’t have to be spent in Miami with classmates. You can use that time to reconnect with your family and friends. When you are home for Winter break, make the effort to keep in touch with those school friends while also catching up with everyone from home. Basically, learn to juggle. It is never going to be perfect and it may never feel how it used to feel.
The whole point of college (besides learning and getting a degree,) is embracing change and accepting it through all of its discomforts. It may be challenging, but it is definitely not impossible.