College isn't the end
*Written on March 5, 2016. Regardless of what college I am going to, I still feel the same way. I am the same person I was before and after college admissions. College admissions - a process where I was crushed and where I was shocked. It's a process I still don't understand but what I DO know is that it has helped me gain more confidence in myself either way. Each rejection built me up and each acceptance did not affirm me/create me, it showed me that there was more than one road for me. And this is definitely not the last college blog post I will write:
College will never define you. It seems like it right now, it feels like the next email we open or the next letter we get in the mail will be the death of us or the beginning of something new. It feels like a freaking ultimatum and that's not what college is at all. Sure it's important and yeah we've spent the majority of our high school careers working up to it, but it's not everything. *Gasp* how could that be? So everything that our parents have told us thus far about how CRUCIAL which college we go to isn't necessarily true? Well I certainly hope that's not what you were thinking still, but yes college is not the last step in our lives. Just because you go to a good college doesn't mean that you will suddenly become the next Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerburg or whatever high ranking person in society you want to name off the top of your head. No matter what college you get into, you are still YOU.
There are so many things that are factored into the college admissions process. A lot of those being things you can't control - your financial status, your parents' level of education, your race. But one thing that you can control is how you respond to these college admissions results. You can choose to tell yourself that you were never good enough, that these results only confirmed your prior belief that you were never good enough. Or you can tell yourself that college is becoming more of a business than a real pursuit of education, and move forward as you find yourself being happy with where you go rather than bitter that you didn't end up at the college that you thought were of your dreams.
No but I get it. It's hard. It's hard to overcome the idea that in ONE email all your dreams up until that point from freshman year can be crushed. We've all been there (if you're a senior right now) and we understand what you're going through. It's natural to feel crushed and to think that you're not worth anything. But think about it - it's one email. Are you really going to let one email tell you that you aren't worthy of dreaming?
A college result cannot tell you who you are, who you have been, and who you are going to be. Only you can. You can let what these emails and portals tell you define you, or you can use it to motivate you to make them regret that they ever rejected you in the first place.
I'm not saying that a college education isn't important. Education always has been and always will be important in our success, but the institution that we learn at, it isn't as important. It's really what you make of it. This isn't to say that you aren't allowed to be upset when the results come out or on the positive side, jump with joy. This is to say that what happens starting 2016 is your choice, it is in YOUR hands no matter what you get in the mail.