N O S T R E S S

Things I've learned about college:

• Go
• take notes
• talk to teachers
• know what you can handle
• tell people what you can handle
• demand the best
• (you ARE paying for it)
• don't waste time/money
• and always do what you enjoy (why you're in college in the first place.)

Here's the thing guys. You do not need college. College doesn't want you to know that. Your parents likely don't want you to know that. Society wants us to believe we need it to succeed, and because it's accepted as fact jobs are going to expect it because they can.

You are there paying for a piece of paper that says you chose to make your life more difficult, put in effort, and pay lots of money to have whatever career you're perusing. That's why it's impressive. That's what's setting you apart from everyone else.

But for you personally, college isn't anything that you don't make it. Make it an opportunity to push yourself, to do things you haven't done before. To learn, not because you have to, not because of your parents, but because it matters to be able to articulate intelligent thoughts with your peers. We are as enlightened as we choose to be. College is your chance to marvel at something. If you're marveling at a professor, or art, or the realization that you're ready to choose a career, it's there for you to do that.

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"You don't have to be in college to play beer pong," John Green.

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If you decide that you're there for yourself, for some greater purpose than pleasing your family, or anyone else for that matter. If you're there of your own choosing, for your future, but for your present too, then college is for you.

And I'm only saying this because today in math class I knew that college was for me. Even though I haven't a clue what is going on in there, I'm challenging myself. I'm going to get through it. Because college isn't worth stressing over, you don't have to pay a university to hate your life, you really could do that for free. College should make you happy. And if it doesn't, then it's really simple to leave.