Archive for the 'College Taught You What!?' Category
Making Friends and Fitting In: The Elusive Struggles of the Ugly Duckling!
By Charlene M Brown
If you’ve been following my articles for awhile or if you just take a look through this category (College Taught You What!?), you will find that I often talk about (well, write about) what college didn’t teach me, noting the irony in the title!
Well, this time, I am going to talk about what I did learn while I was in college.
My senior year in high school, was a little rough for me. My best friend had just transferred to a new school, and in her void, I was shut out of a lot of things that I had only been included in because of her. I was stressed about getting into and going to college, tired of taking tests and filling out applications for this or that. I was just plain tired!
In August, I went off to college with this same weariness.
My first year in English class, our final paper was a topic of our own choosing. The professor would call on us to get up in front of the class to read what he deemed “excellent” papers. That year, I gave a tearful, heartfelt “speech” (it was really an essay) about how the great people I had met in college made room at the table for a militant mixie like me. Those are some good people!
Sometime during that same first year, I got booed off the stage (a very humorous story!), which led me to leave the confines of the university and push out an about in the city. There I met many of the wonderful people that the transient city had to offer. I was well-nurtured in the artists’ lair. More good folks!
I had roommates who stayed up talking with me in the kitchen ‘til 3am. I had classmates who “thought I always had the right answer” and took a chance on partnering with me. People who really “got me” and could explain things to me in a way that I understood! People who taught me great lessons about myself that I didn’t even know I was looking to learn. Some of these have been cultivated into my greatest friendships today!
I met people while I was in college who I could have incredible intellectual conversations and share great laughter with. For the first time in my life, I had girlfriends who could laugh and giggle with me. I remember fondly our “Girls Nights In” which usually consisted of Disney movies and some form of music playing/singing!
While I was in college, I found a great love and acceptance in people that I didn’t know existed before. And an unexpected closeness with people I knew before I got there that made it all worthwhile!
In college, I learned the true meaning of “embrace”, both in its physical form and its mental and spiritual forms. I learned to live life as an adventure, new and beautiful every day! I learned that I could, indeed, change the world!
How AWESOME Is that!?
So Go!, Enjoy all that college has to offer you or has already offered you! Be in Awe of all the amazing people and places and things all around you!
On that note, I wrote this poem while I was in college—it’s one of my favorites, and I want to share it with you:
(For K)
Look at that rainbow
The man carelessly standing at the light said.
I looked.
I wanted to BE that rainbow
I wanted to be that rare phenomena
That filled the world with light, where we thought there was none! © 2004 CMB
Do You Love Your Life Now! I DO (Because I discovered great people while I was in college!)
My College Lied To Me: The Falsities of Getting A Job After College!
By Charlene M Brown
I don’t know about you, but when I was in college, I was under the false impression that based on the education I was supposedly receiving, I would have job offers flying off the table when I was done!
This was not the case at all when I finished college!
College doesn’t tell you what it’s like trying to get a job in a tough economy. College doesn’t teach you to fend for yourself when you are not the golden child!
As I neared the end of my college career, I had a few interviews, but none that I wanted to take. But I was lucky to even have those!
A young woman I met this past weekend and one of the young women I mentor are both facing a similar situation as they prepare to complete their university degrees: neither of them knows exactly what she wants to do with her self and her life.
And this is a situation many of our young college graduates face as they prepare for the next phase of their lives—they don’t know what they are supposed to be preparing for.
For me, I went to a reputable institution and got a degree that has top-tier accreditation attached to it. Yet I was not the Golden Child of my class. The one thing I knew with certainty when I graduated from college was that I didn’t want to do what my school was pushing me to do!
I was torn!
And on top of that, I had the expectation that if I put in the work, somebody would offer me a job! As it turned out, I didn’t have a single job offer after coming out of a prestigious institution with Honors! I was utterly confused!
I did what they asked me to do: I played the game, I got the grades they told me I was supposed to get, I had the internships I was supposed to have, I had the “mold-able, good head on my shoulders” like I was supposed to. Why on Earth, did I not have any job offers!?
I’d been duped!
The REALITY was that getting a job was no piece of cake. It took me some time to navigate the waters and figure out some of the things I might possibly want to do. My list of things I didn’t (don’t!) want to do gets longer and longer by the year.
Any of this sound familiar!?
But guess what!?
There is hope!
We are all better at some things than others. Very often we find that it is not what we went to school for. There are various reasons for this and whatever yours is, it’s okay! Going to college doesn’t necessarily speak to the things we are most passionate about!
However, college is a great time of your life to explore some of these things. They may be extracurricular activities like dance or music or politics. Or maybe it’s a class that you enjoyed so much, it prompted you to change your major!
My point is: DO THINGS THAT SPEAK TO YOUR PASSION! Let college remain behind you and be fully present in the Now!
I have a girlfriend who graduated with a degree in Finance! When she got out of college, she got her teaching certificate and taught high school Spanish for a few years stemming from spending a semester abroad in Spain! Now she is in culinary school! None of this has anything to do with her Finance degree. But she is living in the moment. She is flexible enough to decide to change directions and take the steps necessary to do it!
I genuinely admire this about her. But what I love most is her carefree spirit about all the shifts in her Life’s Direction.
This is what I am encouraging you to do: Go, be free. Follow Your Passion!
Don’t worry about what college did or did not teach you. You can learn along the way! Live Your Life To The Fullest, no matter where you are in that Life!
Do You Love Your Life Now!? I Do! (Because I am learning as I go, and it has nothing to do with my degree!)
Everything I Was Supposed To Learn In College I Already Learned In Kindergarten
By Charlene M Brown
By Charlene M Brown
By Charlene M. Brown
Did college teach you to lie? To get through by the skin of your teeth? To scramble to make the deadline? To sweet-talk some professor into extending the deadline just for you?
By Charlene M. Brown