Truth Hurts

A Game Changer from the perspective of my first year of college.

When my roommate first walked into our soon-to-be dorm, she said it looked like a jail cell. It’s quite funny how our jail cell has become our favorite place to be on campus most of the time. But I’ve realized that’s the weird thing about college: not everything seems to go as you expect it to. Moreover, since I’ve only been here for approximately four weeks, I’ve already managed to keep a list of some things that proved to be different than what I expected: 

1. Dining hall food doesn’t entirely suck. I love the constant reminder that I need to eat my five servings of greens from the salad bar right when I walk into the dining hall. But of course, there are the three ice cream machines placed on my way out of the dining hall, also reminding me to grab a scoop (or many scoops) before I leave.
2. The library isn’t the worse place on campus. Don’t get me wrong, a trip to the library before always felt like exam week was approaching. However, five floors filled with big glass windows and comfy chairs become a change of scene for my friends and me while we’re doing our homework.
3. The expectations I held for myself for college aren’t even close to being met.

I’ve always been an aficionado about personal growth, looking to the future to bring myself to be a better version of who I was in the past. There were things about myself I absolutely hated in high school and vowed to not repeat in college. A lot of that fit within the categories of how I acted or how I presented myself to the world. With that, I promised that going into college I wouldn’t hold myself back due to fear or judgment and let that hinder my ability to flourish in a new environment. I thought that stepping onto campus, I would magically transform these things about myself because I was starting all over in a new place. Growth comes with change, a journey, we all know that. But weirdly, it wasn’t that first day on campus I really began realizing this. It was four weeks later after an interview that I thought went horribly wrong.

To keep it brief, I interviewed for a position that would represent my freshman class. It was my idea to make a step in the right direction to put myself out there and show off my strengths in a productive way. The interview happened, and I immediately called my friend telling them how it went. Specifically, how badly it went. I felt uneasy, waiting for that rejection, and when it came later, it unfazed me. I came home and immediately found myself questioning if I’d been holding up to the unruly expectations I brought upon myself.

Am I doing everything I promised myself I wouldn’t do just a few months ago?

To be honest, this interview itself was trivial but there was a problem rooted much deeper than that. Besides knowing the truth hurts, there’s nothing worse than dealing with it. I knew for a while I wasn’t meeting those expectations for myself, but navigating how to continue pursuing new things after became a challenge.

After a few lingering thoughts at 12 AM, I figured I should actually make an effort to reach those expectations I had set- in a more achievable way. One of the first habits I set when I first started journaling was to set three small goals for the next day. So, that’s what I did.

We’re all constantly growing and modifying ourselves to meet these expectations we hold for ourselves. Rather the type of person we strive to be every single day exists in the back of our minds as a template, not as a current expectation. Growth takes time, especially in the face of change. The great thing is you’ll slowly begin to resemble that person you work every day to be if you productively work towards it.

Despite not being some of my expectations, there have been some things that have exceeded my hopes for college thus far:

1. I am best friends with my roommate. I remind her to brush her teeth, follow each other’s friends on Instagram, and encourage each other to be better versions of ourselves.
2. I have time to do things I want, and if I don’t, I get encouraged by my peers.
3. I have adapted somewhat smoothly to the college work-life balance, despite missing my friends, family, home-cooked meals, and my dog (but he seems to be doing fine without me).