Tag: School

Life Update

I relaunched this blog at the end of March and talked about how I really had no idea what I was going to do with my life, but I wanted to do a little update now that I have a true direction!

I am going to graduate school! For those of you who didn’t see my Barbie-movie-themed announcement on social media, I officially got into Pace University starting later this summer. I will be getting my Master’s in Communications and Digital Media. The one thing I have always been passionate about is storytelling. Both consuming it through books, movies, TV shows, or music, and creating stories myself. I love seeing someone’s imagination come to life on screen or in the pages of a novel and I want to be a part of that moving forward in my life. This online Master’s program will help me do that. I start on July 13th and will be taking Creative Writing for Media Professionals and Communication Research and I am so excited to dive in! Getting back into the swing of schoolwork will be a challenge but because these are subjects I am very interested in, I genuinely can’t wait to get started. I’ll keep you updated on my graduate school journey throughout my time there, but for now, everyone wish me luck as I jump into a sea of papers and projects!

I am going to be an online literacy tutor! When I was starting to think about the kinds of jobs I wanted to do while in grad school, I was looking for flexible part-time work and BookNook fell into that category. I was actually a literacy tutor at the YMCA in college for a couple of years, so it is something I already knew I loved doing. Watching kids make progress in their reading skills and helping foster a love of reading at a young age are two of the most fulfilling things I have been a part of and I look forward to doing it again. It is online and I set my own hours, so it is a perfect side hustle to have. It also keeps me working in the book world from a different angle. Looking forward to starting this month!

I am going to be working at a local store part-time! While literacy tutoring is a fun way to earn extra money, my other source of income while I am in school will be working at Abode Mercantile, an incredibly welcoming home decor, gourmet food, and gift shop right down the road from my house in East Nashville. It is a part of a street of stores called The Shoppes on Fatherland which are some of my favorite places to support local artists and businesses. Some things I love about the store I will be working at: the support they show local artisans by selling their products, the ability to meet all sorts of interesting people who come into the shop, the fact that they are dog friendly, and the ability they have to make you feel welcome the moment you walk in. I start training this week and I can’t wait to get started. Having this steady source of income along with tutoring gives me the flexibility I need to complete my schoolwork and also still have a life outside of all of those things. I didn’t want to look for another more corporate, stressful 9-5, 5-day-a-week job that left me nights to do schoolwork and then absolutely nothing else. Being able to do school and tutoring on days when I’m not at the shop, will leave some nights still free to hang out with my friends and maintain some work/school/life balance that I’ve realized is so important.

@pastedonsmiles

Nashville Night 1 was everything I ever dreamed of! Will remember this concert forever and always! ✨💜#taylorswift #erastour #taylorswifterastour #taylorswifterastouroutfits #taylorswifterastournashville #nashvillenight1erastour #nashvillenight1 #nashvilletn #taylornation #swifttok #sparksfly #swiftie #speaknowtaylorsversion #foryou #fyp #taylorsversion #dropeverythingnow

♬ Sparks Fly – Taylor Swift

I saw Taylor Swift! This is not really the same kind of life update about my new path, but it is something that just happened that I will never forget so I must share haha! My brother who came down from Maryland, one of my best friends who came over from Utah, my roommate, and I all went to The Eras Tour for Nashville Night 1, and boy was it everything I ever dreamed of. How Taylor Swift has the stamina to do a 3 and a half hour show with almost no breaks I will never understand, but I’m so grateful for it. We got to scream the lyrics to all our favorite songs and witness the surprise announcement of Speak Now (Taylor’s Version). And if that wasn’t enough we also got surprise songs from the two eras I wanted them from: Sparks Fly and Teardrops on my Guitar. Truly a perfect evening! If you want to see us all experience the day check out this TikTok I made!

Life this year has been full of ups and downs, but I’m excited about the path that has started to form for me. Anxiety surrounding change still hangs around every day, but an underlying feeling of contentment and gratitude is there as well. I appreciate you going on this journey with me. If you would have asked me at the end of last year, where I’d be now, I wouldn’t have said any of the things I just listed, but that’s what makes life so interesting. Looking forward to seeing how the rollercoaster twists next.

What have you been up to? Anything in your life you are excited or nervous about? How do you handle change? I love hearing other people’s stories so let me know!

Rachel (:

Senioritis

It’s a few weeks into my senior year and senioritis has already set in, which bodes well. It has hit in a lot of different ways, some educational and others personal. With each passing day, I feel it a little bit more. My anxiety has grown stronger as the senioritis sets in, and I’m working to find ways to calm myself down. It’s a new stage of life which always brings along challenges that I have to face. As my therapist has reminded me and I try and remind myself, I’ve gotten through life so far, so there’s no reason to doubt I’ll get through this time as well.

I always heard people talk about senioritis in my classes, but didn’t fully understand what they were talking about or thought they were exaggerating. Now being a senior myself, I see that they were not. In terms of strictly education effects, I feel far less motivated to do my work than I have in the past. From day one, it has been a struggle to make myself sit down and focus on getting an assignment done. At this point in my school career, I have written more papers and done more presentations than I can count. I feel burnt out. This is a weird feeling for me because I have always been a student who tries hard and been a straight-A student. The ambivalence that I have toward school is a new feeling. I still want an A, but I feel no desire to do the work that would get me there. My roommates and friends are feeling the same way and therefore there is not a lot of motivation happening. It’s more just complaining. I’m trying to switch my mindset to being more positive, but it’s difficult. I want to enjoy my last year of college, even my classes. I don’t want to look back and regret not doing my best work just because I was tired. It’s a daily struggle and one that I hope to overcome in the days to some.

My senior year has also given me senioritis personally. This is my last year of college before I enter the real world. Just writing that sentence stresses me out a little bit. Even though it is only first semester, I can still see the finish line up ahead and it isn’t far off. I got an email about applying for graduation the other day. That’s insane. College has gone by so quickly and I don’t think this year will be any different. That scares me a little because it means I have to think about my future. I’m taking a Business and Professional Communication course this semester (sounds super interesting right?) and it is all about applying for jobs and getting ready for interviews and finding a career. It makes everything seem even closer. I am not a person who does well with uncertainty. Most of my anxiety comes from dealing with the unknown and not having stability. Those are the two biggest things you struggle with as a senior. I have no idea what job I’m going to have. Plans I thought were semi-stable with friends have started to shift and suddenly the ground beneath my feet is starting to move. I’m trying to picture what my life will look like, and I can’t and that doesn’t feel great. I’m really working with my therapist to talk through all of this and remind myself of the things that I can see and feel in the moment. I live in the future and play scenarios over and over in my head until I can’t see what’s happening right in front of me.

That’s the other part of senioritis. Trying not to miss out on moments. There’s a lot going on. All of my friends have school and jobs and internships. But I don’t want to look back on my last year of college and only see those things. I want to see concerts and eating ice cream and driving with the windows down. Trying to balance everything is difficult. Trying not to live in the future what-ifs and actually experience what’s happening now is difficult. But difficult doesn’t mean impossible. Often senioritis, and in turn, my anxiety feels like a looming presence unable to be shaken. As cliche as it sounds, it can feel like a rain cloud is following me around. With each new assignment or each new thought about the future, I feel myself deflating. But this isn’t forever. Also, in the now it is important to focus on all of the fun things about senior year. About all the memories I get to make. About that last assignment being written. As each day passes, I want to try and look at the bright side instead of worrying about all the stuff that hasn’t even happened. Senioritis is a frame of mind, I just have to climb my way out of it.

Hopefully, some of y’all can relate to these feelings whether you are in your senior year or you are just worried about the future. We’re in this together and we will overcome it. That’s the goal.

Rachel (: