In my 19 years of life, I have always lived in the same house. I've never known anything besides my little rural hometown of 500 people. The 28 other kids I graduated high school with are the same kids I went to preschool. I love my house and I love my family and as I get older I become more and more of a homebody. Given the choice between going out to a party or staying at home with my family, I would pick staying home nine times out of 10. Maybe it's due to the fact that I've lived in the same house my entire life, but I just like staying at home. However, I always told myself that when it came time to pick a college, I wouldn't pick a school that was really close to home; I would pick a school that was at least an hour away. And I recommend that every single person does that if given the opportunity.

I wasn't scared when my family dropped my off at college; after all, it was only an hour and a half from home and my best friend since elementary school was only 5 minutes away. When we started freshman orientation activities, though, I realized that I knew absolutely nobody and I was beyond nervous. How do you make friends? All of my friends at home were people I had known since elementary school or people I played sports with; I had never actually had to make an intentional effort to make new friends. Putting yourself out there and talking to complete strangers in an attempt to become friends with them is a scary thing to do, but it can be so rewarding. Within the first few days of being in Columbia, I met some of my closest friends. Was it kind of intimidating talking to random people? Yes. Am I glad I did it, though? Absolutely. Don't be scared to be vulnerable and talk to new people, otherwise, you're never going to get to know anyone. And just because you become friends with someone in the first few weeks of school doesn't mean you're going to still be hanging out at the end of the second semester. Everybody is scared and nervous and clinging to the few people that they know. But you'll meet more and more people throughout the year and it's fine to drift away from people.

Don't be afraid to talk to people in your classes because first, it doesn't hurt to have somebody you can study with and second, you can end up becoming friends. Some of my better friends from school now are random people I sat by at the beginning of a class and struck up a conversation with. Also, I cannot stress this enough, live in the dorms at least one year. Living in the residence halls is not the nightmare that it is made out to be in movies and on TV 50 percent of the time and spoiler alert but it's also not the giant party that it's made out to be the other 50 percent of the time. Living on campus for at least a year is probably one of the best things you can do for yourself. Hopefully, you'll be rooming with someone similar to you and you'll become really good friends. Leave the door to your room open; get to know the people on your floor. The girls who lived across the hall from me this past year are some of my absolute best friends now and I can't wait to be back at school with them. Some of my favorite memories from freshman year came from me and my friends just sitting in our rooms talking and just hanging out.

I'm not going to lie, a vast majority of my weekends were spent at home during my freshman year. I would leave Columbia as soon as I was done with classes or babysitting on a Friday and I wouldn't head back to school until about 8 p.m. on a Sunday night. I'm a homebody and I just liked being home. It wasn't until about halfway through the second semester that I really started to stay at school during the weekends and let me tell you, I wish I would've done it sooner. I had more fun in CoMo the last two months of school than I had all year, and it's because I actually stayed there to have fun. My advice to incoming freshman is go away for school and stay there. Let yourself be present, get to know the people who live across the hall from you, go out with your friends. I'm not saying to never come home, but don't miss out on memories you could be making at school. I missed out on a lot of things with my friends, and instead I got to watch what they were doing through Snapchats because I wanted to go home instead of stay at school. I've had the same home my entire life but now I've found a second home, and it's in CoMo with my friends.