High Expectations

Throughout my high school years at Los Altos I have learned so much about myself, who I am, and who I want to be in the future. I feel like throughout middle school and the beginning of high school, I received pretty good grades so it got me in this mindset from the beginning that I HAD to continue this, I HAD to do well, I HAD to get all A's, and I HAD to try to make everything perfect. As much as this did motivate me throughout my high school career, it definitely gave me some un-realistic expectations. Fast forward to august of my senior year, my college application list consisted of 6 out of 10 of my schools being extremely hard California schools, all of which I got denied from or waitlisted at. It's almost like I spent my entire senior year and technically junior year too stressing about college just to have it not "pay off." I was absolutely devastated when I didn't get into any of these schools after trying hard in high school that I let it bring me down for a very long time. It felt like the end of the world at the time, which I now know is ridiculous. Now, it's mid-may and I can finally say that I am content and happy with my decision to attend CU Boulder and where my life is heading in the next four years. Even after getting off the waitlist at one of my schools that is considered "better" than Boulder, I am still deciding to go to Boulder because I know that is where I would be the happiest and in the long run have a better experience. This experience has taught me a lot about myself and I am glad I didn't chose a school just because of it's acceptance rate, but I chose the one I knew would be the best for me and where I knew I would be successful. I spent so much time being upset about the situation for practically no reason that I now know when people say "everything will be okay" that they are correct. I am fortunate enough to even be able to attend and afford college and very fortunate to be able to go to a school like Boulder. Keep your heads up and don't take life tooooo serious, everything works out :)