What Really Happens After College & Advice About Everything & The Last 4 (or 5) Years For Me
Confession: I wrote this blog post last year & here we are finally posting it :) So imagine all the things I've done in the last year that I never thought I'd do!
TimeHop is sometimes my greatest friend & sometimes my meanest friend. Like. It’s been 8 years since I graduated high school? Cool, dude. (p.s. Now it's been nine.)
BUT. The other day, on June 11, TimeHop told me I graduated college four years ago (ugh, five). And I mean, I know that, but the first thing I thought wasn’t “FML I am so old” and this is probably because I look twelve, but my first thought was “My goodness I have done so many things.”
You know, in college I was like really worried that life couldn’t get better. I had my best friends around me all the time, I was doing great at balancing social life (dancing 5 nights a week), responsibility (I got, like, really good grades), and I was somehow making really good money (more on that later). Feeling like you get a pat on the back for just going to class, “doing something for your future”, but also really enjoying your present- that’s a great, comforting, safe, relieving, and reassuring feeling. And after school, when you realize you have no idea how to invest in your future and you have no idea how to really enjoy the present, you hit restart and you get to figure it out all on your own. This is scary. And this is awesome.
When I graduated, here are the things I knew would happen:
- I would move to Australia
- I would move to France
- I would move somewhere else
Yep, that’s about it.
When I graduated, here are the things I thought would happen (they didn’t):
- I would get my second degree in Speech Pathology (I was attending school online)
- I would go to grad school
When I graduated, here are the things I didn’t know would happen:
- I would be fluent in French
- I would go down an entirely different career path than my first degree (Foreign Languages) and even my second degree (Speech Pathology)
- I would move back to SLO & start a photography business & a magazine & a blog & fall in love & be so very, very happy
- I would become addicted to coffee
- I would figure out how to paint my nails & I would have purple hair
Here are things that you have no idea you’re going to do, but you’re definitely going to do (not that I can tell the future or anything but psh maybe I can):
- Chop/dye/finally figure out your hair
- Make new friends (like really), probably your coworkers, which seems just convenient, but is actually awesome
- Keep old friends (the good ones)
- Stop talking to/seeing your friends on a daily basis (AND REALIZING THIS IS TOTALLY FINE)
- Travel
- Stay at home on Saturday nights because that feels good
- Get hotter
- Become more confident (which is even more awesome than actually getting hotter)
- Gain weight (then freak out and probably lose it)
- Change jobs
- Question whether or not you will make your children go to college because who uses their degree anyway
- Fall in love/get married/fall out of love/break up (well, that pretty much covers it)
- Start getting facials & start wearing sunscreen
- Stop shopping at Forever 21 (This will take a while. This is my first year Forever 21 free.)
- Really figure out the kind of people you want to spend time with
- Forget about everybody else
- Become an aunt (biologically or not)
- You MAYBE find a really nice place to live, but like reserve that for your 30s
- Become pretty okay with not having it figured out
Here’s a list of things that you’re going to worry about that are stupid:
- You won’t make any friends
- You will never have any more fun
- If you don’t figure out what you’re doing right now, then you’re never going to get it
- If you don’t land an internship/get a job/get married right now, then you’re way behind
- You’re never going to get married
- If you have to live at home, you’re a failure (free rent is like almost never a failure)
Here’s how you can assure none of those stupid concerns ever really come to reality:
- Make effort in your friendships (friendship is all about showing up)
- Let go of your old ways of fun if they’re not fun for you anymore (maybe drinking til 3 am isn’t fun for you anymore!! Bummer!) and then find out what it is (Day trips for horseback riding? AWESOME.)
- Try a lot of things. Do something.
- Change your mind if you don’t want to do it anymore.
- Work really hard. Do everything 100% and then you won't feel like a quitter if it's really just not for you.
- Read Ecclesiastes 3 and own it.
- Calculate that if you meet somebody now, date for two years, get engaged for a year, then you will be married at 25. YOU’RE FINE.
- Really appreciate your Mom and call her often.
You maybe just graduated. Or it's maybe been a year or two. Or maybe you're graduating next year. Let me tell you, sister, life gets better. I promise.
