Everyone always wants to get out, they're hardly even in.

What is it with people wanting to leave their homes so bad? These are the places that created the people they are today. The places that shaped them. Many people were forged in the fires of their hometowns, yet yearn to be cast in a different furnace. And for what? Because you'd rather have a different set of problems to deal with than your own? Trust J. Cole, and trust me when we tell you there's "no such thing as a life that's better than yours". Don't get me wrong, I feel the pressures just like you do. Spend too much time around mom and dad, and you might get stressed out. Spend too much time around your friends, you might lose your balance. Spend too much time in the past, you might lose focus on your future, and that isn't something you want.

But that's why we strive to find a healthy balance. Call your mom and dad, hang out with your friends, but stay on your grind the whole time. It gets difficult to not end up lopsided with so many competing interests, but trust me, it can be done. What I find to be most important is just looking back and appreciating the process. We might not always realize it because it’s tough to have perspective on something like this, but a lot of work went into shaping us into the people we are today. For me, and many of you reading this, a huge part of this process is the place, or places that we’re from.

Take a place like my hometown of Sebastian, Florida. I wasn’t born there, but I call it my hometown because that’s the place that made me who I am. I spent 10 early years of my life there thanks to my parents, before moving back to South Florida for college. Many people would say I’m lucky to have gotten out of there, and coming back to Sebastian could hinder my future success. For me, I’d have to blame myself if I let anything else than me get in the way of my future success. I’d have to blame a poor mindset that told me being home meant I could slack off. I wouldn’t be able to blame the place that gave me a place to grow, just because of my own mistake.

If we hold ourselves accountable, rather than give ownership to something else over our fate, it might actually give us a free moment or two to look back on the roof our parent worked to put over our heads, and the obnoxious things our friends and teachers didn’t want to put up with, but they did, for us.