College isn’t about striving for perfection. It’s about finding who you are as an individual. As students, it’s easy to feel pressured to excel in our academics. However, college isn’t about academia, it’s the time where you discover your identity and passions. With that being said, my proudest accomplishment has nothing to do with academics. It’s every time I chose to persevere when the odds were stacked against me.
If I’m being honest, for the first two years of my college career, I only focused on school and work. I placed an unnecessary amount of pressure on myself and I was miserable. I rarely went out with my friends, and when I did, I mentally wasn’t present. Instead of enjoying the quality time with them, my mind constantly drifted to my to-do lists. Battling this type of pressure while also dealing with depression and anxiety was pretty much impossible.
There were many times where I was close to giving up. I honestly didn’t want to live because I felt like a waste of space and not worthy of finding happiness. Night after night, I held a bottle of pills contemplating whether to go or not. However, in the end, I chose not to but didn’t know exactly what prevented me from following through. All I knew was a small part of me still wanted to fight, and that’s all that mattered.
College presents many challenges and it’s sad many students like myself feel pressured to be flawless. Although it’s those trying times where we’re tested and where opportunities of growth present themselves. At the end of the day, I learned to accept my imperfections and continue to persevere through every seed of doubt. This learning process involved crying and countless sleepless nights, but whenever I look back on my college career, I’ll smile with no regrets.
That’s why I’m most proud of every moment I chose not to give up on myself. I took a step back and realized with every trial, there are triumphs