This story is what it’s like to lose, but ultimately win much more than you had before.
If anyone asked me what my sophomore year would be like before I moved back in, my response would’ve been entirely different than my reality today – which proves how much happens when you are least expecting it.
This is the long story shortened.
School began again, and after the first couple of days ticked by, I came to the crushing realization that I was completely unhappy. The life I had known when I was a freshman — my classwork, my old friends, and my job, the one I had worked so hard to obtain — was not making me happy anymore like it did just a few months ago. And I couldn’t believe it.
I spent so much time the first week back on campus trying to snap out of it, reminding myself of my campus life and my obligations to it, since I was clearly still adjusting. Right? I just needed time to adjust again, and everything would fall back into place. I was wrong, though, and I knew it. I was lying to myself to avoid diagnosing the real problem: I was utterly unhappy. And if the cause was everything I had, I guess that made me something of lost, in search of things I didn’t know anything about.
It came over me forcefully — like when I was five, sitting on my boogie board right where the tide crashes on the sand. I was waiting to be splashed, but then a bigger wave than anticipated crashed right on top of me, sending me and my board flying. This is what lost felt like.
What was there to do? I needed to nail down the issues, though some I couldn’t change. I couldn’t drop the classes giving me trouble that I’m required to take. I couldn’t change that I was perpetually hungry, due to everything in the dining hall making me ill and in turn me constantly thinking of Mom’s chicken cutlets. I couldn’t help that people who I gave everything to last year had forgotten all about me. All I could do was work on coming to terms with it all, only worrying about how long that will take.
So I started giving thought to what I could change, if anything. I could start by changing my horrible attitude. That I could maybe, probably do.
I decided I’d start trying. What a difference that makes. I got out there and searched for the unknown that would fix me. I tried not to be afraid of what I didn’t know and embrace it instead, remembering that what I did know wasn’t for me anymore. I just held faith it was out there, and that I would find it.
Spoiler: I found it. Well, I found some of it, I guess, since I can’t be sure that I found everything. But, I tried some new things, and though they scared me; the thrill made me happier. So I think one answer to being found again is to embrace the new and scary.
Going with that is to embrace the new reality. I was unhappy because I wished I had what I didn’t have anymore, and I instead needed to be grateful for what is here now and the thought of what is to come. What is not yours is not yours, and I needed to keep that in mind.
The last conclusion I drew for now is to keep faith. Feelings are fleeting, and though that means some good ones pass, as do the bad ones. And so does the feeling of being lost. You will be found, given time. Believe it will happen, and strangely enough, the belief does help it happen faster.
Sometimes, lots of life happens in a short span of time, changing everything and tests all of you. Sometimes it will lead you into territory where you are now considerably and officially lost. It happens. It’s all about what you choose to do when it does. Just try.