I was never really considered popular. --I always found this a little weird since I was friends with most of the "popular" girls from eighth grade and up.-- But, I accepted it as it was and made my way through high school as a fairly average person. I wasn't really into sports or drama and I definitely wasn't into math club! But I did get involved with band and art. I have always been fairly good at art and I loved color guard.

Moving away from home in itself is a big step, but moving four hours away to a college in a different state was quite possibly the scariest and most exciting time of my life. I was going to be the new girl again. No more being the same girl that everyone knew from kindergarten to sixth grade and to graduation. I had spent all of those 13 years in the same school system with the same classmates and the same teachers. My graduating class was 109 students.

College was a big deal for me. Not only did I feel like I had something to prove to myself, my family and the people back home, but I also felt like I was finally going remake myself. Maybe here I would be more popular, more recognizable, and man was I in for it. I came in like a lion. I immediately made a bunch of friends with a large group of people. I let my inner personality flow. And flow it did. Maybe a little too much. It wasn't long before I was frequently asking myself --in the shower, my thinking space-- why I said certain things or acted certain ways. I was never this brash in high school but I was also never this free.

For a little while it was intense, I brushed off the people who didn't like me and thoroughly embraced my inner loudmouth. But this is where college changed me. The people I was with in college were not like the kids from home. These people had their own thoughts and opinions and most of them had a decent backbone of their own. I clashed with a few of them and in doing so had a self realization. Maybe I should tone it down a bit. Maybe I shouldn't say certain things or maybe I should learn to say them more delicately. Some days it was all I could do to just keep my mouth shut and listen to other people.

College changed me because I was no longer one of the smartest kids in my class. My class in college was all of the smartest kids. I was exposed to intelligent people from all over the country and some from across the world. I quickly realized that I couldn't just say whatever I wanted whenever I wanted.

This realization happened towards the end of my Freshman year and as a Senior now I can honestly say I am still working on myself. I feel that I have come a long way. I have learned from different situations that it is better to hold my tongue and just not say a word. The phrase "I lost the battle but I won the war" was starting to make much more sense. I feel like if I hadn't gone through that phase and my experiences in college hadn't impacted me the way that they did, I may not have made it this far. College has taught me to discipline my tongue, stop and listen, be more respectful, be more grateful, and to really look at who you are friends with and I wouldn't change it for the world.