Stay safe on decision day everybody!

acprete
Fri, 12 Dec 2014 04:11:17 +0000

Hey guys!

I just wanted to open up some discussion about the importance of not letting yourself get too upset about a less than ideal decision tomorrow. There’s a lot of intelligent people in this Stanford forum, and intelligent people have statistically higher rates of depression, so I guess I’m worried that there might be some people on here who deal with some form of depression who might take bad news and act irrationally towards themselves based on it. Remember, there is so much more to life than Stanford University. I know it might not seem like that as the minutes count down to 3 PM PST, but I promise there is. Please, if you know you’re prone to dangerous behavior in the case of receiving a rejection letter tomorrow (which hopefully won’t be the case, but it’s important to be ready anyway), find some way to stay safe.

I think a good idea would be to have something planned with friends or family tomorrow for after the decision time. Either it will be a celebration of your acceptance, or it will be a means of coping with deferral or rejection, and either way it’s a healthy idea. If that’s not an option just make sure you participate in something you love tomorrow. Plan to read a book, play the piano or other instrument, go for a run, snowboard, or whatever else you love doing! The more you can surround yourself with positive influences, both activities and people, the more likely you are to deal positively with the potential bad news tomorrow.

Finally, if you feel yourself becoming more depressed than seems logical for a rejection or deferral from one university, talk to someone about it. It’s not worth letting yourself fall into a dangerous state of depression because of Stanford, no matter how important it might seem to you at the moment. If you can, talk to a close friend or family member about how you’re feeling, but if that’s not an option there are online resources or even people on here (me, for instance) that would be more than willing to help you cope with a disappointing admission decision.

Thanks everyone and I hope we all have a safe and pleasantly surprising decision day tomorrow!
Austin