About a year ago, I was packing up my stuff after a
Multicultural America lecture. It was just a normal Monday in Dr. Rugh’s class.
I don’t remember what the lecture was on that day, although I’m sure it was
very enlightening. As I was putting my notebook in my backpack, the thought
that popped into my head was this: “I’m in college.” Now, I’m sure you’re all
thinking, “This is the girl who just graduated? The one who realized she was in
college almost three years after she started BYU?”. Obviously I had noticed
before then that I was in college. But for some reason, it hit me anew that
day. I think it was the ordinariness of the moment that made it so
extraordinary for me. That was the moment that I realized how normal it was for
me to be in college. I was no longer that scared freshman who acted like she
knew exactly what she was doing but really had no idea. Nor was I the innocent
little sophomore afraid of speaking up in class for fear others would notice
her and disapprove. No, now I was a junior who not only belonged here, at this
university and in that classroom, but I was comfortable here. BYU campus was no
longer a dreamland that I was trying to convince everyone, including myself,
that I belonged in. This was real life. I was living that dream.
I’ve had
many similar moments since then. I had one the first time an article I worked
on was accepted for publication, the first national psychology conference I
attended, when I took the GRE, when I finished all of my grad school applications,
at the interviews I had for grad school, when I was accepted and committed to
go to BYU, and the day I graduated. All of these times have shown me that I am living my
dreams.
The
funny about these dreams though, is that they are not the dreams I’ve always
had. When I was little, I dreamed of becoming a great ballerina, a movie star,
and of being on Broadway. If I had kept these dreams my whole life, I would
have felt like a failure a hundred times over by now. But the beautiful thing
about dreams is how they change as we do. At BYU, I’ve accomplished things that
I had never even known to dream about when I was younger. I’ve been overjoyed
at getting things that I never knew I wanted.
Since my
realization that day in the black hole that is the basement of the JFSB, I’ve
tried my hardest to not let myself be surprised by the accomplishment of my
goals. Instead, I’ve tried to fully enjoy and celebrate them. That is what
graduation was all about. To celebrate the accomplishment of a goal all of us had.
No matter what other dreams we have or where we go from here, we have all done
something great and of great worth. We have graduated from a difficult,
incredible university equipped with the knowledge and skills that, if nothing
else, will help us to serve our family, friends, and community more fully. We
should never give up on our dreams. But we should never be so focused on the
future that we fail to celebrate them either.
Our
dreams also help us to become who we are supposed to be. They push us beyond
our comfort level. Often times, accomplishing them is flat out scary. However,
in trying to accomplish our dreams, we learn new skills that help us to
progress. As you change, embrace who you are and use every experience to your
advantage. Last Winter, the unthinkable happened to me: I got a C. Admittedly,
I had a hard time with this. A lot harder of a time than I let on to most
people. However, rather than considering it as a failure on my part to reach
the level I had set for myself, I chose to look at it as a triumph. I had
learned that it is okay to not be perfect. I had learned to prioritize my
classes and accept the results of the efforts I put into each specific one. I
learned to bounce back rather than dwelling on it. I learned to accept who I
was, not a perfect, straight A student, but a normal, imperfect one.
Above all, to be successful, you
have to be yourself. I worked for a couple of years for a professor as his
teaching assistant. At the end of the class, the students in the class had to
give an oral, group presentation. In discussing these presentations he
expressed his frustration with how boring many of them were because so many
people think they need to be boring to sound intelligent. He described how
frustrating it was to see completely delightful people one-on-one turn into
robots in high pressure situations. After he pointed out, I started seeing it
all over the place. And, in the end, those who are true to who they are in all
situations are more successful. In my many, many freak outs preceding each step
of the graduate school application process, the advice to be myself and be
confident in myself is something that was reiterated to me by those who are
much wiser than myself.
As the one of newest graduates of Brigham Young University, I have a lot
to offer the world. The aims of a BYU education state that it is an education
that should be Spiritually Strengthening, Intellectually Enlarging, Character
Building, and Lead to Lifelong Learning and Service. While I will still be at
BYU come September, for now, the first three are set in stone. The last one is
entirely up to me.
