Everyone keeps on asking me how I feel about approaching my senior year of college. I find myself reluctant to say that I’m actually excited. I feel really nervous because I know this is the most important year to open myself up to the best opportunities post-graduation. This knowledge feels especially pressing because I’m very unsure what I want to do with my life.
I don’t expect to have complete clarity when I graduate, or even an amount of clarity that makes me feel comfortable and secure. I know in my gut that I’m not going to graduate with an explicit plan for myself, and I’m okay with that. But when this school year ends I want to feel that I did everything I could to better myself, understand my strengths and give myself the best shot at finding a career that I’m passionate about.
But that works as the easiest part–deciding you want to elevate your life. The difficult part exists in the how. I’ve found it difficult to realize my strengths as I continue to grow, and focus more on the things that I’m not good at and the things I never want to do with my life. This year I want to change that.
I want to stop just thinking of the things I can do and instead discover what I can really offer to the world and actually do them.
Growing My Interests: Movie Edition
One thing inextricably tied to this idea includes my interest in films. Films have been a huge part of my life for most of my college career and even before then. I love to participate in the film world outside of just viewing actual films whether it be through the classes I’ve taken, the things I’ve read and watched, the podcasts I’ve listened to and the conversations I’ve had. I want this interest to potentially lead to a career and I want to challenge myself and my interactions with movies. So this year I have a goal to keep a journal and talk about the films that I find meaning in and write movie reviews only for myself. I do often write about movies that I feel specifically connected to, but not in a way that has any sort of discipline–it just happens randomly.
I have hope that this endeavor helps me sort through all the noise in my head about senior year jitters and be an outlet to further interact with something I love. Writing has a weird way of giving you answers that you never expected to questions you maybe didn’t even originally have. I’m hoping that writing about films and my life, I don’t know, makes me realize that I actually do have something interesting to say? I want to make strides in finding my voice and realizing what my mind has to offer and writing plays a large role in that process. That’s a way we can easily all elevate our lives, write more.
Learning to Stick With Things I Want to Do
Apart from writing, I am focusing on the fine art of discipline. I plan to get into productive habits and push myself to work harder and be dependable in all my relationships, in any sense of the word. I know I possess the talent and the creativity to do something in my life that I find meaningful, but I need to improve on disciplining myself to get work done and not procrastinate.
I also want to discipline myself to not give up on something I want to pursue. Not doing something exists always as the easiest option and I’ve grown susceptible to it time and time again. But in a crucial year in my life, the time has come to stop falling back on the easiest solution. In a year, I won’t be in college. My habits won’t cut it. With that realization, I know I need to work on the way I manage my time.
I Want To Be Proud of Myself and My Accomplishments
All in all, I find it really important to be proud of the work that I do and to learn something from each experience. Outside the prism of the idea of doing things only for career advancement and opportunity, I consider an elevated year one where I really feel as though I gave it my best. I don’t want to plan my year out or pinpoint what I specifically want to get from it, but I will consider it a success if I’m proud of what I did in a professional sense, in the way I work on myself and in the relationships I’ve formed or kept. I don’t want to put too much pressure on myself either, I am only human.
Instead, I consider my final and elevated year of college one where I made mistakes. I don’t need to try my hardest every single second of every day, but I want to push myself into spaces I’m not accustomed to and do things outside of my comfort level. I am optimistic in my several commitments that I’m excited about, I can find a balance that makes me proud of the work I do and proud of the person I grow into.
