So here we are, the end of summer is fast approaching. The days of pool parties, summer internships, and family vacations are at an end. We now have to prepare ourselves for the upcoming academic year. Whether you’re going back to high school or college, the nostalgia of these summer months can weigh heavy on our minds, but this time around can be especially hard for college students.

We just reunited with our family and hometown friends, and we’ve spend so much time with the people here it feels like we’ve never left, only to remember it’s back to campus in a matter of weeks. The whole situation could be emotionally stressing. Don’t get me wrong I love college and I do miss my suitemates, but there’s just something about home that always makes me miss the days I never had to move away.

For a long time, I thought it was the year-round warm weather or the beautiful sea breeze (along with missing my mother of course) that left me so nostalgic during freshman year. But being home made me realized how much I romanticized this place, it wasn’t just my tangible home I had missed but the familiarity that came with it.

I arrived home about a month before any of my friends and when I tell you I was bored out of my mind, I am not exaggerating, but once they got home all of that changed. It made me realize how much I’d missed them and how comfortable our time was together. With them, it felt like we’d been apart for 9 hours rather than 9 months. Being with them was familiar, it was safe, it was everything I grew to love and found comfort with, and heading back to campus means that safe feeling leaves when each of us do. I just want to remind you that the discomfort is not necessarily a bad thing.

I would encourage everyone to embrace the feeling of nakedness when the familiar is being stripped from you at the end of this summer. If your pre-college friends are anything like mine they are not going anywhere, it’s a friendship that’ll last a lifetime. So keep that in your mind and feel free to venture into new things this year. Make new friends; explore the opportunities your university has to offer, explore the places around you, and do something that makes you a little uncomfortable- not just to say you did it but to learn something from it.

As I'm writing this advice I must admit that much of this is for me rather than any audience, because believe me when I say coming out of my comfort zone is one of my greatest fears. It's something that I- that we- need to accomplish in order to grow and expand our mindset in our personal, professional and academic lives.

Hang on to the comfort of the people and places in your hometown before you part with it. Never forget who and what made you become the person you've grown to be, but on that same note remember to continue evolving outside of convenience. Take risks and learn to appreciate the good that awaits you in the world of the unfamiliar.