I have been cooking a post like this up for years and I have finally gotten it out! Everyone cheer. I think it's Elle magazine that does these. In 2019, Taylor Swift put out a piece called "30 Things I Learned Before Turning 30", and I've been making similar lists for every birthday since I turned sixteen. What really got me to do it was Lily Kincade, an artist I interviewed a couple months ago for this blog. While deep in conversation about journaling, I mentioned wanting to do a piece like this. She was in full support. So if you find any good takeaways in this article, thank both me and her! Enjoy these lessons and photos from fun moments over the past year.

My top 18 lessons of being 18:

1. Say yes to as many experiences as possible.

I started college in August, and my brain immediately entered social overdrive. By far the most emotionally challenging thing about moving across the country was building a new support system from the ground up. However, it still wasn’t as hard as I feared it would be. I met most of my close friends now in the first three weeks after moving in. And of those, I met almost all either while at an event I wasn’t originally supposed to be at, while with a person I wasn’t originally supposed to be with, or both. And as a bonus, almost every single person I became close with was someone I introduced myself to first. Be that person.

2. The world is generally forgiving as long as you’re trying your best.

I’m naturally a very anxious person. While that has thankfully simmered down quite a bit over the last year, it made the idea of moving out and functioning as an adult sound terrifying. I would always read advice like, “No one really knows what they’re doing. Adulting is just pretending that you do” and dreaded putting up such a façade. However, that isn’t how I see it now that I’ve moved out. As a college freshman, I’ve never felt younger. Maybe it’s because my parents raised me and my sister by the motto, “We’re raising adults, not children”. To me, behaving like an adult just means having more responsibilities. You don’t have to pretend you know what you’re doing. There’s often someone willing to answer questions, and regardless, the most you can do is try your best. That’s what adulting is, just with more pressure.

3. Contained hatred for a singular person is a big thing, but one worth recognizing, and should be kept temporary.

"I hate you for what you did, and I miss you like a little kid" - Phoebe Bridgers

I long found it strange how easily some people could say that they hated someone. But over time, I realized that admitting to yourself, “Yes, this is personal” is empowering. People do each other extremely dirty and can deeply damage each other. That isn’t rocket science, and it’s valid to hate someone in the moment, regardless of what you think their intentions were. What matters is that you don’t let it taint your present perspective for longer than it needs to. People will talk a lot about “I should’ve been meaner”, but I find that most of the time, even if I had good reason to be meaner, I wouldn’t undo my own kindness. So let yourself simmer in contained hate for a moment. Once you feel your life has moved on enough (which shouldn’t take more than a couple months), let it go.

4. It’s not that difficult to realize you love someone.

Love is love and it's special, but it's not a rarity. On the flip side of hatred, I’ve always found it odd how much weight people seem to place on the sentence, “I love you”. Love isn't something to be ashamed of. If you feel it, why fight it? "I'm more of a show, don't tell person" - that's not what I'm referring to. Say it and show it if you want, or only show it. Just don't overthink it.

5. Literally all you have to do for people you don’t know yet is be nice to them.

   
   

Moving to the south, which has a more hospitable culture than the north, has made my anxiety so much better. I grew up used to passive aggression, rushing, and lots of drizzle. I felt as if a lot of the culture was "Being too kind makes you spineless, so be colder, or at least a little nonchalant, and people will respect you." This mentality, especially in high school, made my social anxiety suffocating. I now live in a city where people call each other loving pet names without making it sound condescending or forced, will gladly pay for your coffee, and will always hold the door. None of these things may sound entirely abnormal, but they make you much softer when they become the norm. I’m better for it.

6. Christianity is about love.

The religion I grew up around, or rather, the lack thereof, made for a weird adjustment to the very obviously religious American south. It’s been interesting to find that so much of the liberal perspective on Christianity is skewed. Many people in my hometown genuinely believed that Christianity was built around hatred, and our current administration is largely to blame for that. It’s disappointing how the government pits people against each other in such ways. However, that’s about as nuanced as my understanding of the religion gets (curiosity never dies, though – I’m currently taking a class on the Bible). I love hearing about other people’s beliefs. Keeping an open mind is very valuable to me, and I find the ways our brains contextualize things to be very interesting.

7. Religion is not for me.

In that vein, here’s how I contextualize the world’s existence: I don’t. Not really. I’ve displayed OCD-like symptoms for years, and while I know people who find that religion makes their own OCD easier to manage, I personally think it would drive me over the edge. The feeling of a lack of control is the root cause of most of my anxiety, so I don’t think putting that much trust in an entity separate from myself would be good for me. But if you do, I’m happy for you! And if you really want to know, I believe that all the scientific odds worked out incredibly, incredibly well. We are all so obscenely, ridiculously lucky to be on this planet, and I think it was all by chance. However, I respect all perspectives, and I would hope that would go without saying!

8. Curiosity is an insanely valuable asset.

Like I said earlier, I was nervous going into college about finding my people, but I found out quite quickly that one of my greatest strengths is my curiosity. I love making friends with people who have cool hobbies and careers. I adore and admire all my friends so deeply and have never been happier with my circle.

9. If you think it’s too good to be true, it almost always is.

   
   

Look before you fall. And this is not exclusive to any one situation. Friends, romantic partners, career leaps, what have you. I wish I could elaborate more on this, but I’ve simply found it to be true time and time again.

10. Trying to help other people through problems you’ve experienced won’t heal your inner child.

Over the last year, I’ve related horrifically well to the lyric, “You remind me of a younger me, I saw potential” (“Father Figure” by Taylor Swift). When journaling, I’m constantly giving myself cognitive behavioral therapy. What is the cause of this extremely intense concern I have for my friend? It’s consistently, “I think helping them will help heal my inner child”, which then leads me to write, “…but I know it won’t” or “…but I don’t think anything will heal that but time”.

You must want help for help to be efficient, and unfortunately, the most horrible situations in my life (and thus, the ones I try hardest to help other people through) were the ones that made me want to die, not get help. You can only do so much for someone.

11. Your hardships aren’t that unique.

I’ll go through oodles of explanations for how I ended up a certain way, often resulting in me feeling like the universe screwed me over more than anyone else. But especially over the last year, I have found so many people who have gone through deeply traumatic situations similar to ones I’ve endured. Or people who have learned the same big lessons from completely different traumatic situations. You’re not as alone as you think you are.

12. Small decisions tend to make the most noteworthy differences.

My Depop resell business wouldn’t have started if I hadn’t missed my exit once. I wouldn’t have finally begun growing my TikTok audience to over a thousand teenage girls if I hadn’t filmed a video in my car to “I Love You, I’m Sorry” by Gracie Abrams before going to the beach one April afternoon.

More importantly, almost every single one of my friends I made this year was someone I met as a product of an extremely random small decision. One of my closest friends, I met solely because of where I chose to sit in the dining hall on a day that I was especially jittery and extroverted. Meeting her was a split-second decision that ended in, “Hey! You live on my floor, right?”

These realizations are moments I live for. How close did we come to just… not meeting?

13. You know a type of gap in relationships (not just romantic) that often goes overlooked? Ambition gaps.

Having workaholic friends has changed my life. I don’t think I’ve ever been so inclined to be creative and learn. I used to think my soul twins would be connoisseurs of rebellion and cynicism, but my frontal lobe appears to have developed. I still value these things to some level, but I’ve also realized that people who embody these characteristics tend to be drains on my drive. My closest friends will apologize for always being busy, but I shut them down immediately. I respect a strong work ethic more than almost anything else.  

14. If you genuinely like someone as a person, there’s not much sense in overthinking small interactions.

It’s a normal thing, as a teenager, to be constantly worried that people are mad at you, but it’s important to learn where to draw the line. Gut feelings, past unlucky experiences, and generally bad anxiety can make any interaction stressful, but the least you can do is try to trust your own judgment of someone’s character. If you really don’t trust it, instead of picking your own actions apart obsessively, consider re-evaluating who you’re spending time with and how you’re approaching life.

15. Your brain can do insane things to you in an attempt to help you cope.

Without baring my soul on the Internet, it cannot go unsaid that being in college made my past make so much more sense to me. Distance makes emotional attachment to the past weaker in many cases. I’ve realized how many things I convinced myself of, just to pass the time until I was in a better place. In hindsight, nothing about my approach to life even a year ago was that concerning. I wasn’t broken – I was just in the wrong city, and my brain didn’t know how else to make sense of things.

16. Don’t underestimate the opportunities that come with every item in your closet.

I stopped wearing a back brace shortly before turning eighteen, and my creativity began to flourish in the clothing world. The possibilities of scarves and long sleeve shirts (among other clothing items) began buzzing through my brain. Trying to find as many different ways to wear one clothing item as possible is an exhilarating puzzle for me to solve.

17. The mental illness rate, especially among teenagers, is bad.

There is obviously some bias in this statement – I tend to bond with similarly anxious people, and art students are likely a bit more open about their feelings, by virtue of the act of creativity. Nonetheless, the number of teenagers I know who are on SSRIs is astounding to me. That’s just the tip of the iceberg of heartbreakingly common things I observe in my peers, from eating disorders to addiction to OCD. I wonder what would have to happen for these things to become less common.

18. You don’t have to know what you believe in.

I was having a conversation with someone a couple months ago who called me deluded for saying I didn’t believe in a higher power. I found this offensive. Later, I was talking to a friend who recounted a similar experience her agnostic friend had been through. Her friend had said, “I don’t know if I believe in a higher power”. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about religion, and I’ve settled with the same answer for myself.

I think a vital factor in whether you believe in a higher power or not is what helps you maintain your peace of mind. Regardless of where you land, I believe that a higher power would understand that because it gave humans complex minds, there are valid reasons not to believe in it that have nothing to do with our innate loyalty. Hence, I don’t feel the need to place a label on what I believe in.

I hope you found some useful takeaways in this article! Wish me a lovely nineteenth year!