1. Life is learning, not being taught.
At the end of the day, you only truly know something when you can do it yourself. No matter how many classes you sit through or how many times you hear it, if you can’t do it on your own, you don’t know it. Most of the time it doesn’t even matter how you learn it, what matters is your ability to demonstrate it. Your professors and teachers can tell you how to do it, but as they often remind you, they “can’t learn it for you.”
2. Most people are instructors, not teachers.
I had very few professors that I would consider teachers, the vast majority of them were what I would call instructors. Some professors I had actually cared about you and your ability to understand their subject matter. However, most would just give you a book or an assignment, tell you to complete it, and wish you good luck. As frustrating as this was at times, it did help me learn how to study on my own. I also imagine this is much closer to what happens in the workplace though, and career prep is what college is truly about I suppose.
3. Sometimes you’re just a number.
As much as I love and appreciate my school, sometimes you just feel like a number. At my university, I was a 9 digit student I.D. number. To the federal government, I’m a 9 digit social security number and THAT IS OK. While sometimes it’s hard to feel like more than the number given to you, it is important to remember: the institution giving you that number is providing you with a platform to make more of yourself. While you can find your fulfillment in organizations endorsed by your institution, it is up to you to get out there and make those memories that will last a lifetime.
4. Mom was right about choosing friends.
I heard somewhere that you’re a combination of your 10 best friends; while I would argue it’s closer to five than ten, there’s a lot of truth behind this statement. It’s amazing how you can watch others (and even yourself) change when you spend time around people. I saw both sides of this when I was in college as I saw people impacted both positively and negatively because of their friends. While I will personally advocate for you to have a diverse group of friends, I would encourage you to find the friends that allow you to be the best version of yourself, because that’s when you’re truly joyful.
5. A LOT of life is managing expectations.
The first concert I ever went to, I expected the singer to sound exactly like they did on the radio. Much to my dismay, they did not...because I expected them to sound better than they did, I was disappointed. I (and I guarantee you) have had a similar experience with all kinds of things. After a few shocks of both joy and disappointment, I started to understand that my expectations were defining my opinions. I learned that if you set low or no expectations, people will almost always enjoy and praise. However, if you set extremely high expectations and don’t meet them, you get a lot of responses like “it was ok” or “that was decent but…” Hint: If there are no expectations, most people are optimists. Don’t oversell it.
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