As spring semester draws to a close, I find myself in one of those moods where I feel like I've lost my purpose in life and don't know where I'm going. I'm having to make a lot of tough decisions especially since I'm ending my sophomore year and heading into more specialized classes. Turning back is no longer really an option. Choices must be made. My grades are what they are: permanently etched onto cold transcript paper, staring condescendingly back at me.
On some days, I feel like a machine- cold, unfeeling, lacking life and vitality. I've become a person who only craves results. Good grades doesn't mean celebration; it merely means that I must work even harder to maintain them. Poor grades means beating myself up and working myself to death. It's as if my grades have become the dictator of my mood. And then I wonder, "Did Berkeley make me like that? Or is this all a manifestation of my mind?"
Of course, I realize that everything I feel is entirely conjured 100% by me. You want to blame someone or something for your troubles; anything but yourself. You can't admit that you have limitations. I know I certainly feel this way. College puts you in that atmosphere where you don't judge yourself by how you're doing in the class, but rather how you do compared to your peers. If you do as well or better than your peers, your mood lightens and you feel like you can do anything. If you do poorly compared to everyone else, you feel like complete shit. Depression and anxiety take over, you start acting out and you feel like you want to pull down everyone to your same level so they know how it feels. You complain to everyone. You crave attention and want people to sympathize or to hold you by the hand so that you get through it somehow.
Well, guess what? The truth hurts but it must be said: Other people should not be the main source of your happiness. YOU should be the source of your own happiness.
The reality is, everyone in the world is stressed about something, not just you. In fact, everyone always feels like their life is so dramatic but when everything is boiled down, you're really just a minuscule dot in the whole scheme of things. But your minuscule dot, no matter how small, is still apart of the whole. The dot still has to be there to complete the picture. YOU are worth something, even though it may not be apparent all the time. I believe everyone has a purpose. I admit I am a flawed person: I judge, I hate, I gossip, I harbor negative feelings toward others, I get jealous, I get selfish, I get frustrated and stressed when things don't go my way.
But that is really what it means to be human.
I know I write many things that seems contradicting. But the truth of the matter is, I'm still fighting, just like everyone else in this world. I'm fighting to create meaning and purpose in my life when all these other things, these roadblocks, are getting in my way. There are so many things in my head that I try to make sense of, but nothing comes. Nothing comes along to save me and help me figure out the answer immediately.
But that is what it means to struggle. Struggling is part of the natural progression of life. You aren't human if you haven't suffered. Only when you know and have survived the struggle can you truly understand what joy means, what fulfillment means.
Right now, trudging to school, day by day, and feeling horrible about myself almost on a daily basis makes it seem like life has no purpose. But when I occasionally sit down and think about the future, as I am doing now, I come to the realization that the struggles in your life and those experiences you get out of them make you stronger. They make you strong enough to fight for yourself and to carve out your own happiness instead of waiting for some miracle to happen.
So next time you feel down or you feel as if your life has no purpose, remember that you living and breathing and forming meaningful relationships with people is the epitome of life. You are given life to live it. Life can't be easy. If it was, it would lose its meaning. So go out, stop moping, and start living! (I'm telling this to myself too as I'm wrapping up this post!) I promise you everything will be alright in the end.
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