On Overachievers

These days, there is a great deal of pressure on college students to go above and beyond.


If you want to get a job/in to grad school, you'd better be a member of a student organization on top of having a near perfect GPA. Actually, if you really want to do well, run for president of your organization! Oh, don't forget to hand in an application to become a Resident Advisor while you're at it. And get your Superior Edge. Are you still studying enough? Have you gotten an internship related to your major? Stressed? We have a counseling center for that, keep working!

At least that's what I'm hearing. It's like every opportunity that's set before me doesn't feel like it's waiting for me with arms open. They block my path. And while I can tip-toe around them, somehow I always end up going back for these things. When they don't jump out at me, I go crazy looking for opportunities to build up my resume.

Being an RA was probably the worst in terms of this. Don't get me wrong, I loved my job more than life itself and consider it to be one of the best things I've done with my life. But the way I worked was so unhealthy. I didn't use nearly enough of my nights off. When I wasn't in my room, my residents were constantly on my mind. Inherently, I guilted myself into spending most of my time in my room with the door open. I was advised not to worry so much about what was happening while I wasn't around. "But how can I be a resource to my residents if I'm not in my room?" I'd snap back. I think if I heard anyone say that now, I'd probably slap them and accuse them of sucking up to the Man or Wo-man. Seriously, what a kiss-ass thing to say.

So as for the overachievers at NMU, I think I am one of you, and I don't like most of you. But while we are out doing some really cool shit, maybe we need to remind people that you can do really great things and still have a personal life. I'm well over halfway into my time in college and I haven't gone to a house party. And while a lot of that had to do with the rule against that as an RA, I don't think I'd have gone to any even if I had been allowed to go. My skis rested up against the wall the entire winter last year. I haven't taken a road trip with friends yet. I haven't gone camping up in Marquette at all, and have turned down SO many offers to do so when I gladly would have scribbled down "camping night" into my planner. There was just never any room to write it down. 

So when you open the door to a new opportunity, remember there are going to be a whole lot more of those down the line. NMU is overflowing with all kinds of chances to build up your resume (which makes up for the whole N for knowledge thing). Don't let the best years of your life get buried under 18-credit semesters that seemingly need to end in a 4.0 and getting a better internship than everyone else in your major. If you want to go to a party with your roommate, go to a party with your roommate. If you don't like it, get some milk and oreos and watch your friends get shitfaced. Blow your money driving down to Chicago with your group of friends. If you want to make out with someone, go fucking do it. If you don't, get a pet cat and teach it the wonders of Netflix. Spend your down time however you want, just make sure you have a healthy dose of it when you can. You can still save the world and take naps on the daily.

When I am happy I will not forget this.

The bad days aren't so frequent anymore, but I don't really consider myself a "happy" person just yet. I guess I'd say I'm "working on it." 

But I did have a bad night just a few days ago. A friend sent me a picture, a snapshot of her and her boyfriend smiling back at me. I felt like it was screaming at me. Thank god it was only a snapchat, so I didn't have to look at it for more than five seconds. What the hell had either of them EVER been through in their entire lives? Nothing like me. Why am I fighting so hard to be okay, and they don't have to put in an ounce of effort to SMILE like that?! God it was disgusting. 

The day before I posted a new year's eve facebook status about how everything was looking up and I was so happy. Hypocrite? Definitely. 

I remember being sixteen years old, my favorite teacher had just written a gorgeous memoir, and I was at rock bottom. She had been through just as much hell as I ever had. I told her I resented her for it. Rather than being a good friend and celebrating everything she had been through, I spat out accusations. "Why does this get to happen to you and not me?" I had forgotten that the time span between her tragedy and the present stretched out over half a decade, I didn't think about where she was only a few months afterward like I was at the time. I didn't care. I was sixteen and childish. She didn't send me out of the room. She didn't even scold me the way she always did when I half-assed a paper. She understood. She stepped down from her successes for a moment and sat at my side. She talked to me about how she remembered what it was like where I was. I listened to stories of people I will never meet, whose names I do not care to know, and how their stupid perfect lives pissed her off. She hugged me, and I was off to class at CASA, not thinking about how much damage I could have just inflicted. I left without the anger I deserved to have directed at me. 

I forgot about that conversation for a long, long time. I thought about how if I talked to this friend, she wouldn't have been so understanding, and probably rightfully so. There isn't anything right about screaming accusations at people just for enjoying life's small pleasures: New Year's eve with someone you love. Or getting a book published. Yeah, it's the little things. 

But I post about my successes on facebook all the time. I love my school and have been given so many opportunities to grow as a leader, a writer, a scientist, a musician, a young mind eager to soak up as much knowledge as I can find. Does that hurt anyone the way it used to hurt me? 

Talk to me about it. I'll step down from my good life to hold your hand. I will tell you all about the place I was mentally trapped it. Every poor decision I made, and how even though I may have worked very hard to get to where I am, it's really just dumb luck that I am even breathing today. I will remember how I was, and I will not resent you for resenting me. I will talk to you about the time span, how healing doesn't work according to a schedule but that time will, eventually, give you distance from your past. It is truly wonderful, and it will happen. I will tell you that most people aren't even that happy anyway. It's all bullshit, and that you are in pain because you are something genuine suffocating under the superficial. 

This conversation can happen tomorrow or in ten years. I am in a good place, even if I'm "working on it." But I cannot, and will not, forget the bad place.