Four years ago, I entered the biggest transition of my life yet. For the first time in my life, I was going to live with a stranger, be away from my family and dip my toe in the water of independence. Four years later, I’m about to graduate, and once again start the biggest transition of my life yet. While I do get nervous about what my future holds, I’ve learned to embrace the unknown. Throughout my college career, I’ve learned a lot and will be leaving this experience wiser than I came. With that said, here are the main takeaways I’ve gained from my time as a college student.
Some People Just Have to Learn the Hard Way
Throughout my years of offering advice and being there for people in college, I realized you simply have to let people experience situations themselves. It can be hard to sit back and be complacent, but I’ve learned to focus on myself instead of worrying about other people, which can be difficult because I am always eager to find a solution to a problem. Regardless of how much advice you may offer, people are going to do what they want at the end of the day and you can’t let that consume you.
The Importance of Staying True to Yourself
As cheesy as this will sound, I’d never made as many friends as I have in college and I think that’s a result of me being authentically myself for all four years. In middle school and high school, I went through various phases of implementing different characteristics in hopes to fit in or make people like me. Once I stopped doing that, I felt people were finally getting to know the real me and my friendships flourished because of that.
Communication Can Get You Far
As a communication major, this may sound biased, but I find this to be true. You’d think communication is second nature for people, but coming to college, I realized more than ever before that people simply don’t know how to communicate. I witnessed so many people avoid confrontation, not wanting to talk out their problems and let their feelings fester and continue to be upset. I find facing your problems head-on, working on a solution, and putting your best forward will help your mental health long term in college rather than avoiding it.Â
Take Advantage of Every Opportunity Presented to You
I’m an opportunist: when an opportunity presents itself, I will be taking advantage. However, I quickly learned in college not everyone has that same mindset. Whenever there was an opportunity to make more money at work, I would take it. If there was an opportunity to hang out with my friends I was there. This mindset has helped me feel fulfilled and have an abundant college experience. I truly believe every situation is what you make of it, so with everything I pursued in college I put my all into it, which is why if I were to do college over again there isn’t much I would change.Â
You Are More Capable Than You Think
Time and time again throughout college, I second-guessed my decisions, questioning whether or not I was good enough for something. Once I stopped comparing myself to other people and acknowledged my accomplishments I was able to experience college fully confident in my capabilities. It is important to be aware of your strengths and weaknesses so you can work on becoming the best version of yourself. People underestimate the power of confidence, it can completely change your trajectory.
To conclude my last article with HerCampus, I will say that as I’m almost at the finish line of my college career, I’m very grateful for all the experiences college has brought me. I have been able to express myself more than ever before through these articles, my job, and the atmosphere of college as a whole. I’m coming out of this experience full of wisdom, gratitude, and cherished memories.
Thanks for reading, V