College is the perfect time to learn and grow. You are in a place with all of your peers who did not have the “pleasure” of knowing you in high school, and you can completely change yourself. I remember that the first day I got here, I decided that my new persona was going to be totally different from my good old high school days. I was gonna be chill, calm and go with the flow.
That is not to say that I was not before. I was a very quiet, shy teen who was not too keen on talking to anyone ever. However, my little internal voice obsessed over everything if it was not done perfectly and caused me to go into a downward spiral and never want to participate in anything ever again.
Yet, I decided that college was the time for me to change that. I was finally going to be what I always wanted to be: Chill. Sadly, within two weeks, that goal was nowhere to be seen. With the amount of work I had amassed and orgs I had continued to join, it was impossible to avoid and ignore who I truly am: A massive control freak and a help rejecter.
That is not to say I feel this way about everything I do. If you have ever read my column, it is no surprise that I am a little bit too relaxed and chill about things that actually matter, such as academics. But when it comes to stupid little things, like cleaning and organizing the fridge, what time to leave for group activities or even cleaning a small spill, I have a need for it to be done a certain way. Yes, all of these things are not urgent everyday tasks, but I assume that they are on my mind much more than the average person.
Within my first semester, one of my best friends told me, “I think you were meant to be a chill person, and then something just went wrong”.
I was not even the least bit insulted. It was true. The way I like to think about it is if I were an animal, I would be a super chill cat that is secretly always constantly going through an existential crisis and just wants to be a dog. I am completely aware of how silly that sounds, but in the past 20 years of living, that is the only coherent way I have come up with to describe how my brain works.
At the end of the day, I have come to terms with it. Do I have an overwhelming need for everything to be done my way? Yes. Do I articulate and handle that in a healthy way that would help me deal with the strain it puts on my brain? No, I do not. Will I attempt to do that anytime soon? Meh, we’ll see.
The point I would like to stress is that it is not fun to be like this, but when you are, you have to embrace it. Overall, no matter how much you want to control the world around you, not everything is gonna go along with your plan. I guess what I am trying to say is that… if you are a cat, try to embrace your inner dog.