why everyone wishes they were still in college
and how to live life like you still are
When you’re ushered into college after completing your high school degree, grinding to get into the program and school of your choice, and finally getting your chance to taste what is supposedly “the best four years of your life”, you are an unmolded pile of possibility. You don’t know what lies ahead for you. You essentially believe that you could do anything — because you can. And you haven’t yet faced enough reality for people to shake that belief out of you. You haven’t yet applied for plenty of jobs and gotten rejected, failed courses, felt lost, disliked what you’re studying, gotten into a career path which you hate but feel stuck in, and most importantly, you haven’t let your hope fade away.
One of the things which always stuck out to me while I was in University, was how anyone who was older than me would literally buckle their knees in envy that I was still in school, having the time of my life. “Oh, what I would do to go back to University…” they’d say. Or, “Enjoy every second, it goes by in a flash.” Of course when you hear all this at age 19, some of it sticks, but most of it just washes right over you — as it should. You’re young, carefree and just trying to have a good time in college.
Youthful Optimism
But what we don’t realize at that age is the reason why so many people wish they could go back to college is because they wish they could go back to the type of person they were in college. The person with hopes and dreams which would bubble up when they thought about what they could do with their life, the way they looked at their future, and the friendships they felt would last forever.
There is a trademark optimism college students have which everyone longs for. The optimism of youth, possibility and hope.
The sparkle of hope in a college student’s eyes when they tell you with maximal confidence that they will be a doctor, or a singer, or a musical arts performer — their conviction and excitement for it — stirs a deep internal hunger for that hope in others. College is the place where you are preparing to achieve your dreams. It’s the perfect combination of work and fun, where you get to do whatever you want, with few responsibilities except to take care of yourself (for the most part), and the ability to chase whatever it is that you aspire to.
However, when you graduate, and reality begins to set in, jobs are turning you down, and you begin to question your career path — your hope may start to fizzle out.
Cue: the quarter-life-crisis many college graduates tend to face within a few years (or even months) of graduating.
The fear begins to eclipse the hope and those bright-eyed eager faces filled with anticipation and excitement for life after graduation begin to change into something entirely different.
Or not.
Perhaps, instead of losing that signature-college-student-optimism that everyone who has graduated longs for — we could choose to hold onto that optimism.
What if we didn’t let harsh realities and rejections cripple our future plans?
What if we kept undying faith that we could accomplish whatever it is that we wanted to achieve? What if we committed to stopping at nothing to achieve the goals and dreams we had for ourselves at age 19 or 20 (assuming we still want these things)?
Holding Onto Our College Hope
The thing about college is that it makes you feel like you can do anything. It makes you feel like you are invincible, unstoppable, valuable, capable, and worthy of what YOU want. But the real world doesn’t treat you that way. The real world doesn’t really care about your hopes and dreams, it’s just going to treat you like everyone else.
Thus, it is our responsibility to preserve the youthful optimism that college introduced into our lives. Those late night chats with friends where you didn’t care about anything but that moment. That level of presence. The magnitude of the vision we had for ourselves. The confidence that we would just “figure out” whatever came next. That trust in ourselves.
That is the attitude of a college senior. Maybe a bit scared, but mostly excited. Perhaps a bit confused, but mostly hopeful. Perhaps a bit wild, but mostly seizing the moment. Perhaps a bit uncertain, but mostly optimistic.
That precious attitude of optimism and self-confidence is what we, as recent college graduates, need to preserve. It surely hasn’t been a great help that we graduated into a global pandemic and have watched the world erupt into as much chaos as we’ve ever seen in our lifetime, all since we wrote our final exams (on Zoom) just a couple months ago — but it is still up to us what we do next, and how we go about that.
We are graduating into a challenging time. One where anything could happen. One where we don’t know what our next steps look like. One where so much is out of our control.
Focusing on What We Can Control
However, the one variable in life which we can always control, and must not ever forget, is our attitude.
“Life is 10% what happens to us, and 90% how we react to it.” — Charles R. Swindoll
With the world changing so quickly and more ‘traditional’ jobs becoming harder to come by and less relevant, there has never been a better time to lean into exactly who you are. What you want to do. Your own unique talents, niches, aspirations, interests, and strengths. Once you commit to continuing to see yourself for all that you are, and not for the skills, experiences or qualifications listed on job descriptions which you might lack, you might just be able to hold on to that youthful optimism everyone wishes they still had.
Ultimately, college is a time where we strengthen our hope muscles and wait to let the harsh realities of the world strengthen our self-doubt and fear muscles later. The way to stay as happy and positive as we are in college is to keep exercising our hope muscles by continuing to build our self-confidence and leaning into the things which make us feel good and fulfilled.
The world will not hesitate to knock you down, reject you, intimidate you, and make you feel inadequate. But consider all those years of college as your training for those moments.
Let your hope and optimism shine too brightly to let fear overshadow them.
Because after all, everyone wishes they could still be in college. So why not drag it on a bit longer?