No, today’s blog post will not be about the harmful stigma that surrounds gaining weight in your first year of college. That will probably be a blog post for another time lol.

I’ve wanted to make a blog post reflecting on my freshman year for a while now. I made a few drafts about it but everything that happened my freshman year just seemed so overwhelming to be able to put into one post. So much happened: so many blessings, memories, lessons, tears, people, and love. So I’ve decided instead of trying to capture all of it, I’d write down 15 things about my freshman year. These are either things that I learned, a memory that was special, a person or a thing that I think was quintessential to my freshman year.

Freshman year was better than anything I could have imagined. Filled with sweetest memories and the best people, it shaped me into a version of myself that I love. There was some hard times that I grew from and some good times that I’ll remember for a really long time. So, here we go…

1. Make other people feel good about themselves

I put this quote on my spring quarter vision board because I really set it out as a goal for myself to try and make other people feel good after every interaction with me. College girls are not always the nicest and I sort of came to the conclusion that “maybe the way that people treat me is a reflection of how I make them feel.” Now, this is not always true. There will always be people who are insecure, cold, and just mean for no reason. And the way that people feel about me or any problems that someone has with me isn’t necessarily my problem unless they actually communicate that with me. However, sometimes that sentiment is true. In trying to figure out why people were cold or mean, I felt the best thing to do was to try and kill them with kindness. There are specific examples I could use here to illustrate this mantra a bit better, but the ultimate lesson that I learned was pointing towards how to be a better person and friend. If I make other people feel good about themselves, they’re gonna want to be around me, and perhaps they will realize that any negative feelings that they have harbored towards me are unwarranted. This also sets a standard of love and encouragement in a friendship that will hopefully be returned one day as well. I feel like this goal was a positive takeaway from freshman year that I will carry into adulthood and future friendships.

2. Shine and Grace

My lovely roommate Shine is for sure a quintessential part of my freshman year. From silent mornings getting ready side by side to talking in the dark before bed, I can’t imagine having anyone else as my freshman year roommate. She was the perfect match for me in the most God-ordained way. I will miss 206 with her.

Grace was like an honorary second roommate. She lived one floor above Shine and I. The three of us would often do things together. Grace was my buddy for many nail painting nights, walks up north to Lisa’s, seeing shows on campus, and greek life formals. She’s always down for whatever, so I knew I could always text her if I needed someone to do something with.

I’m gonna miss living in the same building as them next year 🥲

3. Dolphin Show

After I was extremely overwhelmed with the club options fall quarter and got rejected from two dance groups I wanted to be a part of, I decided on a whim to apply to be a part of the Dolphin Show. It was such a random thing but I was so thankful to be apart of something so cool and iconic at Northwestern. Not to mention, I ended up meeting so many cool people that I would have not met otherwise. Below are some photos from kickoff night!

4. RUF

Literally where I made my solid group of friends who I did so much with. I can’t believe I was able to meet such fun, smart, pretty, and cool girls in college who also happened to be Christian. Like they’re not weird!!! Thanks God for that fr. I also made plenty of really good male friends for the first time in my life and it really showed me the value of male friendship. Super thankful for these pals! Here’s just a few below:

5. Changing my major…

OOP! Yeah, I listened to that little voice inside my head on day 3 of orientation that was like… “do we really want to do Journalism?”

It was interesting coming to terms with the fact that I really wanted to do something more creative. I dealt with insecurity that people would think I was less smart or didn’t deserve to be at Northwestern as much as STEM majors if I changed my major to something like Radio, Television, and Film. At the end of the day I realized that… it’s not that serious… and it’s my life, so who cares? Excited to see where the new major will take me.

6. CONFIDENCE

By the end of the year, I felt the most confident I’ve ever felt in my life. Maybe it was the subtle glow up I underwent during the school year (but maybe the confidence created the glow up so who knows… what came first the chicken or the egg?) or just the fact that I love where I am right now, but I am so sure of myself these days. Sure, I’m still figuring things out, I don’t know everything, and I change my style like everyday, but everyday I’m sure of the person that I am and who I want to be. It makes it so much easier to navigate things like insecure college girls, boy problems, drama, etc when I know the values that I want to put forward. Freshman year gave me the opportunity to apply a lot of the values and lessons that I learned during my gap year that I didn’t even necessarily realize until I was using them this year. I hope next year brings even more clarity and confidence in who I am and where I’m going.

7. My quarterly resolutions

I started making quarter resolutions after fall quarter and will probably make them for all of the quarters from here on out. I love that the quarter system gives you so many new beginnings in the year, and I love the opportunity to set out new goals and measure growth for myself. My resolutions would consist of things like: have lunch with a friend 3x a week, workout 3x a week, journal each day, etc. It really helped me to prioritize and make time for the important things. I’ve already gotten started on my fall quarter resolutions so maybe I’ll make a blog post about those. 🤭

8. The male validation will not hit the way you think it will

Literally so much to say on this one yet so little to say as well. To keep it short, nothing actually happened in the boy department for me this year but I just ended up hurting my own feelings. I also realized the attention from a boy that looked so desirable was actually not all that. In conclusion, please focus on your friends, don’t go on dates you are emotionally unavailable for, and DON’T BE DELULU. 😭 (I’ve shared too much 🏃🏽‍♀️🏃🏽‍♀️)

9. the fits!!

speaking of confidence… I was very proud of multiple outfits I put together. I will be upping my game sophomore year in the COMFORT department of my outfits but I think the curation of a good outfit and wearing it with confidence really helped make my year a little more enjoyable. Below are some ones I found in my camera roll lol.

10. The family facetimes

can’t forget my homies back in NJ. My family and I would try to do a weekly FaceTime. I would overshare all the updates with them. here’s a sweet video of them singing to me on my birthday.

11. Allison Dining hall

She was there for me when I need her. She betrayed me sometimes in my darkest hours. She provided happiness and other times disappointment. But she was a staple, and to her I will return in the fall.

12. My secret study spots

So obviously I can’t disclose my secrets but these spots were a freshman year staple. They are where I would go on Saturdays and WORK all day on Saturday so that I could…

13. Keep the sabbath holy

My Sundays were usually like this: go to church, come back, call my family, eat lunch, sit around, watch tv, read, paint my nails, take a walk, be bored, go to dinner, sometimes go to snacks with Grace… and how lovely it was. I loved having a rest day and it was often a quarterly resolution to keep the sabbath holy. It didn’t happen every week but when it did… phew😫!!

14. DANCE / Refresh

So I got rejected from two dance groups in the fall. One I was way in over my head unfortunately and just had to come to terms with that. The other one had quarterly auditions and I got in in the winter!! I am so happy that Refresh Dance and being a part of a team was part of my freshman year experience. It’s so cool to be a part of such a large and creative community and I can’t wait to see where it takes me next year.

15. My blog!!

Ending out this post with one of my proudest accomplishments from freshman year and that’s that I started this blog! I sometimes forget that I have it and other times can’t believe that I actually did it. I’m so glad I have this place to keep all of my thoughts and share them and that people actually read them. So … as always…

Thanks for reading!