Most people start college at around 18, give or take a couple years. We’re thrown into the world, expected to have a career plan and strategies on how to pay off student loans, when we’re barely old enough to vote and still not old enough to drink. It’s a struggle on all sides. This is the curse of the 20-somethings.

The number of times per week I hear fellow college students say they have no idea what they're doing, or that adult life is hard, is astounding. Everyone who has been through the American education system can agree that high school does absolutely nothing to prepare us for real life. And that sucks. Teaching ourselves how to function in society is a curse we’ve got to deal with.

During the time we're in college, we have to become independent from our parents, accept that debt is a fact of life, get our own apartment or house, cram as much education into our heads as possible, probably change our career path multiple times, and we’re expected to find our future spouse. If you’re not stressed out just thinking about that, then please tell me your secret. If you are, take a deep breath and welcome to the club. 

The consolation prize is that we’re all in the same boat blindly stumbling through adulthood. We may be different financial, emotionally, and physically, but we’re all cursed. If you’re like me, adults have told you how lucky you are because, "back in the day..." That doesn’t mean our stress and sleeplessness is any less important or relevant than what they went through. This curse of the 20-somethings has been around for ages, and everyone who has been through it knows what it’s like. We’re all broke. We’re all clueless. And, we all know that life can be freaking awesome when we put the stress aside and live a little. 

The moral of this slightly pessimistic story is take advantage of college years. I’m only a sophomore, and have no idea what I’m doing, so by no means am I calling myself an expert on surviving adulthood. But, once college is over, we hit the curse of the late 20-somethings, and then the monotony of the 30-somethings, which comes with its own toils of family life and sticking with a career. So, in the long run, 20-something is easy. We get to make excuses to go out every night of the week and are still brilliant enough to keep on track to graduate on time. We stuff our days with too many extracurricular and still manage to schedule in a daily nap. In short, we’re awesome, but we don’t hear that enough. So embrace the awkwardness of early adulthood. The curse might not be too terrible after all.