Not Enjoying College

juillet
Wed, 17 Dec 2014 04:48:39 +0000

I think you’re overwhelming yourself with a lot of thoughts at once - you have had some negative experiences and they are snowballing into one big lump of despair. Take things one step at a time.

At a school where partying seems to be the main focus, it can take a bit longer for an introverted non-partier to find their niche or collective. I know it probably seems like everyone has already made rock-solid friendship group, but really, you have only been there for three and a half months. Trust me, not everyone has made a rock-solid group - and you can still find entree into already existing groups, plus finding ones of your own.

When you say that the people you met haven’t turned into anything, why haven’t they? I remember my freshman year in college. After watching so many shows and movies about college, I expected friendships to simply materialize, because they seemed so easy - a group of people who live in proximity to each other just magically share tons of interests and become lifelong friends! But nah, it doesn’t really work out that way. Friendship takes some work, especially on the front end, and somebody has to do the work to make the proximity happen often enough that the friendship grows. So is it that you guys meet once and then never get back together? You might have to take the step to invite people to do stuff, even if it’s just “I’m grabbing lunch now, want to meet in the caf in 15?” You say you’ve tried out clubs, but it hasn’t yet led to friendships outside the club. Give it some time. Again…it’s only been 3.5 months.

As for your roommates…it seems like the problem there is quite nebulous. You just feel left out of their friend group and sense they don’t like you. It could very well be that they don’t, and there’s nothing that you can do about that - but reflect on it a little. Do you think they really don’t like you, or are you feeling so down and out that you are projecting that onto them? What happens when you try to get involved in what they do? Is one of your roommates more amenable to chatting with you than the other, and can you get him/her alone? But even if they don’t, I know that kind of sucks, but you don’t have to be friends with your roommate(s). They’re just people you have to coexist with. Triples do suck because privacy is scarce, but that’s to be expected when you share…unfortunately. A double next year with someone new might be a good source, though - I do know some folks from undergrad who became friends with randomly paired sophomore year roommates!

If you’re still a freshman, though, don’t worry about the career so much - in the sense that you don’t need to fret about the fact that you don’t know yet. That’s quite common. I have a PhD and am working as a postdoc and I’m not entirely sure what I want to do for a career! (Although I’m closer!) In fact, part of your job in college is to find out what you like to do and figure out some potential career paths. You know you don’t want to be a doctor - that’s good. What things HAVE you thought about? Visit your career center. Most career centers would welcome visits from freshman trying to figure out their interests and goals, and they can help you write those down and puzzle through them. As you take more classes, you might find a deep abiding interest in something - the idea of combining computer science and biology into bioinformatics, or using biology to track disease spread as an epidemiologist, or switching tacks altogether and going into marketing research for a pharmaceutical company. Who knows? You are working towards something - working towards defining your own interests and figuring out what kind of tasks you enjoy (and don’t). Let that be your motivation.

I think it’s quite common to not realize what you had until you are gone - for teenagers to want to get away from their parents so badly only to really miss them when they move away. For 17-19 years you lived at home with your parents there every single day of your life and now, suddenly, you are away from them! That can be hard for a LOT of freshman, and you aren’t alone. It’s a transition, and only time makes it easier.