“If we don’t change, we don’t grow. If we don’t grow we aren’t really living.”
-Gail Sheey
Imagine a fertile garden. This garden is the foundation of great opportunity for the seeds that are planted in it to grow and blossom. Within this garden, each seed sprouts and evolves in its own way, depending on factors that include the amount of water and sunlight it is given.
College is just like this garden. It is a new chapter where many seek the opportunity of not only receiving a higher education, but also readiness for the real world as an adult. However, college evolves people either for the better or the worst. Despite the outcomes of change, it is completely a natural part of life, and besides, why start a new chapter in your life if you are still stuck reading the last chapter?
New Chapter, New Me
College is an opportunity to start fresh. In most cases, people come into college with this very mindset. Whether it is ditching a childhood nickname to go by your original name, dying your hair a funky color you have been dying to try for a while, or just finally breaking out of your quiet shell to be more outgoing. College is where many aim for carefreeness and a new image in which they might have been hesitant to trying before.
Becoming Independent
College life is a wake up call to a majority of students because the nature of being independent is more important than ever before. Your mom is not going to be yelling at you to do your chores and your professors are not going to beg you to attend class or turn in your assignments.
However, some students will adapt to this eye-opening responsibility quicker than others. These people are the ones who have come to terms that it is vital to mature by becoming responsible in order to successfully adapt to the culture of college life, whereas other people will struggle by still being reliant on others, like their professors and parents to succeed.
Meeting New People
The college community is enormously diverse and consists of people from near and far. It is common that most students will meet individuals that they probably would or would not have hung around back at home. Unlike high school, it is common that most people will start their college life living on campus with their peers. Because of this, the possibilities that you will be hanging out or studying with your college friends most if not all of the time, are greater.
Realistically speaking, when you are around someone all of the time, their characteristics and lifestyles tend to rub off on you, which can also cause you to adapt to them without even knowing. Some of these characteristics can be their drive and determination when it comes to reaching personal goals, others can be their poor decisions when it comes to not studying or skipping classes. Despite the new people that you will meet in college, it is important to be cognizant of how will their characteristics will positively benefit you mentally, emotionally and/or spiritually.
Finding Yourself
One of the biggest things that changes people in college is their pursuit in finding who they are as a person and their purpose. When you embark the journey of finding yourself, you are pursuing what you are most passionate about and utilizing it for your own and sometimes others well being.
For instance, a person might find they are passionate about about helping others and enhancing the community. That person might use that passion and place it on a platform to run for a position on student government. Someone else might be a fitness addict. That person might also use that passion to build the image of serving as an on-campus fitness trainer to help other students who may not be able to afford a profession trainer to become healthy and fit.
No matter what it is, college is a place where anyone can collectively utilize their passions and talents to not only establish their reputation as a person, but to benefit others.
Work hard so you can play harder
Although the main reason why people go to college is to receive an education, college life is more than just studying late hours with your nose and eyes glued to a textbook. There is also a more enjoyable side of college life, which is having a social life. As stated before, college comes with a level of independence. There’s no parent there to nag about your curfew or when you should be studying for your next exam, it is all up to you to make these decisions. It is completely fine to take a break from studying ever so often to go out to the movies or a party with a group of your friends.
However, this new level of independence might cause many students to struggle with prioritizing, while forgetting the initial reason why they are in college. Learning how to balance a social life and your academics is the key to prioritizing. Some students might see that the majority of their peers are at some party and might make the decision in going knowing that they have not submitted their assignment that is due at 11:59 p.m. Other students might make sure that they have all assignments completed before they go out and have a good time.
In the end, the decision you make in prioritizing can either make you or break you. Just because you see that everyone is making their social life more of a priority than their education does not mean you have to follow in their footsteps. After all, not many kids have the opportunity to go to college, so why plumish this great opportunity by making your academics the least of your worries because you wanted an increased social life.
-chandlercolclough