And a lot of things have happened during my time here--a lot of things to learn from. I've changed...and yet at the same time I haven't. Some things about me have definitely changed; I've matured a bit, definitely. I've had some rough experiences and come out to tell the tale to people. But at the same time, I feel like the same old person I was when I was 15 and a half. It's very weird to think that I was a sophomore in high school five years ago. When I was a sophomore, it was easy to note the differences between 11-year-old me and 16-year-old me. I grew a couple of inches, I gained a figure, and I gained confidence and (some) maturity. But now, as I'm nearing the age of 21, I feel essentially the same as a person as I was when I was 16, but with less confidence (ha!). And I've been berating myself for a while now about that. Isn't college where I'm supposed to change, find new ideals and become a much more sophisticated person? Isn't it where I'm supposed to find my identity in some type of "-ist" and let the liberal in me come alive from the conservative prison I was raised in? Isn't that what's supposed to happen to me? A lot of people have had that experience in college, and for a long time I wondered why I didn't fit into that category. People would share their experiences of this and that and others would applaud them and I would wonder if I was wrong for not having any of those experiences to share. I wondered if I was wrong, or even deficient in something (yikes) because none of the new contemporary labels really fit me.
And then it hit me, slowly and then all at once (pop culture hehe): if I am a unique person, created by God with my own personality and experiences and other things, then why am I trying to let the world define me?
I realized that the world in all of its forms can try and put me in a couple of boxes, but none of them will completely fit me. I'm a sum of several parts. I have my own DNA, my own personality, and my own destiny. Some people really identified with the things we've heard and seen in college, and they made several changes, and that's awesome. I'm happy for them. But just because I haven't changed that much or made myself fit in the mold this new society has for me, doesn't mean I'm any less than any of them.
So here I am! I have a lot of new experiences and ideas to share. But to be honest, I'm basically the same as when I was 16. And I'm pretty okay with that.
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