22 Small Reminders I Needed To Hear At 22

1. You don’t need to be in a relationship to have a direction after college. Choosing a location when you’re not sure about your job search is already trying, so sometimes it seems easier to wait to see where your S.O. goes. But being in a relationship cannot be the one deciding factor when it comes to moving or staying put.

2. You don’t need to be in perfect shape at every phase of your life. When things around you are uncertain, exercising can be a great outlet, because it makes you feel like you’re putting energy somewhere that will actually yield tangible results. But you don’t need to push yourself to workout too much just because you want to look a certain way, or because you feel like it’s the one thing you’re in control of.

3. Success is not measured by what your college GPA is.

4. Living with strangers isn’t nearly as scary as you think it’s going to be. But, yes, you should definitely interview roommates before you and your roommate decide to sublet to someone off Craigslist for six months.

5. Holding on to the idea of someone is dangerous, because it makes you forget how they actually treat you. And in the end, no matter how much you care about someone, just because there was once love between the two of you doesn’t mean they’re the right person for you now.

6. You don’t want ice cream as drunk food. You want fries. Savory foods are always a better post-drinking choice.

7. You will outgrow people, and people will outgrow you, and you aren’t a bad person for not trying to stay in touch with every friend you made between middle school and your 22nd birthday.

8. The time before you hit the working world is such a gift. Because even though you might spend the month after graduation feeling like you’ll never get a full-time job, you will, and when that happens, you’ll wish you had taken the time to appreciate when you didn’t have to be somewhere from 8 AM until 6 PM, or wake up for a 6 AM conference call.

9. The people who are three, four, or five years older than you don’t have it figured out either.

10. Be patient with the friends who support you through difficult times. You will have little fights, about very, very little things, but a good friendship should never be ruined over details that will be insignificant in a few months.

11. College majors aren’t completely useless, but they also aren’t the be all, end all of your life. They won’t necessarily govern what job you get, so the last thing you should be doing is berating yourself for getting a degree in a potentially suffering industry.

12. You need to fucking calm down.

13. You can’t whine about not getting hired when you decide to watch 13 hours of Girls instead of filling out the job applications open on your computer.

14. When there is something upsetting you about any situation, confront the root cause and actually take care of what’s bothering you, as opposed to brushing it off and allowing the problem to sit beneath the surface.

15. If you feel like shit every time you sign onto social media because you feel like you aren’t making progress at the same pace as your peers, sign off. Challenge yourself to get off Instagram or Facebook for a week, or even a few months.

16. Not everyone meets the love of their life in college, and you certainly don’t need to. Because college is basically four years when you can meet unlimited amounts of men/women your age who have gone through some sort of screening process, people think they need to take advantage of that and turn the place into a breeding ground. That’s not actually the case.

17. Calling your parents isn’t a chore, and you shouldn’t treat it like one.

18. Don’t discount advice from people that you think don’t understand what you’re going through right now. That’s underestimating them, and it’s cheating yourself out of potentially good advice. Even if it’s not valuable, don’t be so impatient that you blow people or their ideas off.

19. Self-care is important at 22, even if you don’t think it is. Go to the dentist. Brush your teeth. If you can put the money aside to get a facial or a massage, do it. Maybe don’t eat pizza for dinner four days a week. Even when you’re swamped, you still need to make sure you’re taking care of your body.

20. Take pride in the work you do, whether it’s finishing one of the last papers of your college career, or writing a cover letter for a job. If you look at it after you finish writing and hate it, try to rework it so that you feel really good about it.

21. Now is the time to put yourself outside of your comfort zone. Even though it’s terrifying, you have very little to lose. You just need to have faith in yourself.

22. Start learning to trust yourself now, because it takes a long time to fully trust yourself. The sooner you start the journey, the better you’ll get to know yourself, and the more confident you’ll be.