What I Learned in College

I still can’t believe I actually graduated college!! It is finally starting to settle in that my college career is officially over. I am very eager and excited to enter the next chapter in my life because I know bigger and better things are headed my way. But I can’t help feeling nostalgic. My four years of a college feel like a blink of an eye, but thinking back to freshman year feels like a lifetime ago. I have grown so much over the past 4 years and have become a much better version of myself with a refreshed outlook on life. I have been looking forward to writing this post since the second the idea popped into my head. I am giving you the inside scoop of the main life lessons I learned in college. Stayed tuned to end and I will be sharing a little life update and my future plans.

1. YOU CAN DO ANYTHING YOU SET YOUR MIND TO

I know, so cliché, right? I used to hear this string of words all the time, but I never thought it held much truth…. 4 years later, this basically became my mantra and the saying that got me through pretty much everything. It’s crazy how much your mindset affects your day to day life. In all honesty, you CAN set your mind to do ANYTHING you want. If you truly want something, all you have to do is work for it. If you don’t achieve it, you either didn’t want it bad enough or it wasn’t right for you at the time. Because the truth is, if you truly want something, you’ll find a way to get it. You won’t stop until it’s yours.

At this very moment, I bet you can think of something you want to achieve in the future, but you may see no way of getting there. I also bet that you are in a place that a year or a few months ago, you never thought you’d be. It’s not just coincidence or luck, you worked hard and made it happen. I have learned over the past few years that the really good things in life (relationships, health, career) do not come easy, you have work hard, really really hard. If you want to change in your life, you need to take action! Nothing frustrates me more than hearing people talk about how they wish they had a better job or wish they were skinnier, blah blah blah…. Get up and make it happen people!!! Most people don’t get handed things in life, they work for it!….and if they do get handed things it’s because someone else worked really really hard. But are you ready for this?! The cool thing about your life is that you can create it. If you don’t like something, change it. You get to do that because guess what, it’s your life!!!!!!

There’s a funny little quote I love because it embodies my whole philosophy of creating a life you love. “I stopped waiting for the light at the end of the tunnel, and I lit that bitch up myself.” I love this so much because you can’t just wait around your whole life waiting for good things to happen or to be happy. You have to get out there and it all starts with your mindset. If you truly and deeply want something, you will get it, and it’s as simple as changing your mindset. If you are always saying things like “I’ll never get a good job,” “I’m too poor for that,” or “I’ll never be that fit,” well obviously not if that’s what you’re telling yourself! You have to believe it’s yours. You get in life what you put out into the world. So stop wishing for things and start working for them. The world is truly up grabs. 

2. YOU LIVE FOR YOU

I have quickly learned that you have to stop living your life to please other people. Of course, you must care for others and it’s natural to want everyone around you to be happy, but you have to ask yourself, am I even happy? At the end of the day, you need to do what makes you happy because YOU live for YOU. You shouldn’t choose a career to please your parents, you shouldn’t dress a certain way to fit an image you could care less about and, you shouldn’t act a certain way to “fit in.” Life is too short to worry about pleasing everyone around you instead of doing what actually brings you joy. If you want to pursue your passion, do it! It’s also okay to change your mind about things. If you want to move, rent the truck and do it. If a friend becomes toxic, ditch them. If you’re using a degree at a job you hate, change your path. What’s more important, your degree or your happiness? Again, life is too short to walk around being miserable. And really, I’ve gotten to the point in life where I couldn’t care less about what people think about me and my life because it doesn’t concern them. I care more about how I view myself and if I am happy.

Moral of the story is to start living for yourself, peruse your dreams, not the ideas of what others want for you. Before I went to college, I had a small change of heart and wanted to change my major to something fashion related. My family and everyone around me told me not to do it because I wouldn’t make any money and it would take forever to get to the point where I would. Now I not saying I don’t love teaching and the path I chose because I do and I’m excited to pursue it. But I do resent myself a little because I listened to everyone around me instead of listening to myself. Fashion is still such a passion of mine, hence why I created my blog. So this is the form me be living out that dream and who knows where it will take me in the future. I think it is so cool that blogging can be a full-time job and for now I am going to keep working hard and see where it takes me! 

So I challenge you to ask your self this question, “Am I living the life I want to live? If not, how can I make it happen?” Change never comes easy, at least for me. So if you know you need a chnage in your life, it can be scary. But just know that life begins at the end of your comfort zone and if you want something youve never had, then youve got to do something you have never done before.

3. MISTAKES ARE LESSONS

It took me a while to actually appreciate and be grateful for the mistakes I have made. Mistakes make you into the person you are today. Not the mistake itself, but what comes after. By this I mean, how you reflect upon your mistake, how you reconciled it, and how you choose to proceed in the future. No one and I mean no one is perfect. Everyone makes mistakes and you know what, it’s okay. It is apart of being human and it’s going to happen, you have to accept that. Throughout my years of college, I started to change my mindset about mistakes. I used to freak out and the mistake would be all that I thought about. When you mess up, own up to it and try to put it behind you. That is way easier said than done especially when you tend to dwell on things. But dwelling on your mistakes does nothing but make you feel like garbage. Of course, you have regrets and wish you could reverse time and make a better decision, but sadly no such thing exists. There is no sense in thinking about it because you can’t change the past. So I have learned to make peace with my mistakes and use them to teach me a lesson. When you view your mistakes as lessons learned, you’ll never do it again. I would not be the person I am today with the mistakes and experiences that shaped me. So start being grateful for the mistakes that have you have made, I guarantee you wouldn’t be the person you are today without them. 

4. FRIENDS COME AND GO 

This took me a longggg time to wrap my head around. I thought it was the end of the world when I lost a friend or a friend and I grew apart. As time went on, I learned that friendships, just like relationships take a lot of time and work. I then came to realize that friends will come and go throughout your entire life. Like I said, I used to think this was a bad thing. But I have learned that friends walk in and out for your life for a reason. In my experience, God sends friends into your life when you need them and in some cases never lets them go. Other times, friends leave you when they have done their job. This can either be to teach you a lesson or to serve some greater purpose. But I bet every single person reading this has had a friend or person that has come and gone in your life. What did they teach you? Sometimes friendships can end horribly but I bet if anything, that person taught you something.

Even toxics friends can teach you a lesson. The thing about toxic friends and people is that you are the company you keep. In my opinion, a toxic person is someone who is always complaining, talking about others, lazy, and thinks everything is a competition. The people who give you that pit in your stomach when you’re around them or see them pop up on your social media. Who wants to be around that? Not me. Now I’ve had my fair share of toxic friends and all I can say is you need to ditch them. Take out the toxic! Life becomes a lot more beautiful when you get rid of the negativity. It is most certainly not easy, especially when it may involve losing serval people. When you look back, you’ll be happy you cut off the people who didn’t bring you joy because it opens you up to so many other beautiful people and possibilities.

Life Update

After graduation life got a little hectic! I had a few weeks off and spent it relaxing, hanging out with friends, and moving my sissy to Chicago for her internship. For the summer, I have a nanny job in my hometown of Erie and I also teach English classes online to the cutest little kids in China! Looking forward, I am actively searching for a public teaching position in the inner city of Cleveland. I just moved into my new house in Cleveland and if I don’t land a teaching position I plan to work as a substitute teacher and continue teaching English online.

I plan on blogging a ton and sharing a lot with you this summer! Please DM me with requests and any questions you have! Thanks for reading, it means the world to me! I hope this post opened up your eyes to a few things. Have the best day ever and smile because you’re beautufu!