Dear Future High School Graduate,

Your time is almost here. After four long years of hauling your backpack around the hallways, drama, and good times, you’re almost done. But before you put on that graduation gown, I want to tell you a few things that you will experience throughout your college experience. Some are good and some are not so spectacular.

This time can be both happy and sad. It’s happy because you are about to enter a whole new world that you never knew before, but it can be heartbreaking because you are about to say goodbye to everything you know. As a high school graduate, I can safely tell you that you will be okay out there in the "real world." Here are some of the things I can guarantee you will bump into along the road:

Pure, blissful happiness

When you walk across that stage, you will feel as if the whole world is there and ready for you. When you step on a college campus as a freshman, you will feel the opportunities flooding your way. The friends you meet will give you pure happiness and you're bound to have wonderful times. You will be happy for your friends when they find love or get a good grade. You will feel happiness by joining extracurricular activities on campus.

Utter sadness

Along with happiness comes the occasional sadness. You will miss your family much more than you ever thought you would. Although they are a phone call away, you will miss the hugs. You will miss their in-person good mornings and good nights. You will miss everything about them. This kind of thing is something we take advantage of throughout grade school because people tend to not realize what they have until it’s gone. You might fail a test and feel sadness from it. College is a lot more strenuous than high school -- you can’t just make a simple path for yourself. You don’t have people holding your hand anymore. You are (for the most part) on your own in making decisions.

You will experience heartbreak

Now comes the moment many of you fear: the heartbreak of being away at school and changing your lifestyle. You may have a boyfriend that you fell in love with in high school. He was perfect for you and now that you’re meeting new people and trying new things, you just simply can’t see him in your future. Some couples make it through college and get married, but let’s be honest here; the majority of high school couples break up to experience new things in life. This is completely okay. Your heart will shatter at first and it might seem like the end of the world but I promise you that if you experience this heartbreak, things will get better. I experienced it myself and although we are not together anymore, he still holds a special place in my heart. Your high school sweetheart will always hold a spot in your heart as well -- hold onto that.

Absolute joy

Life as a whole will bring you joy. Four years from now, you will be graduating college and leaving behind the new life I’m telling you about right now. Someday, you will have a family of your own. You will experience joy when you’re walking down the aisle, when you see your newborn child, when you see your child(ren) growing up. Life if full of joy -- so if you are debating on doing something good for you, do it. The more you better yourself, the more joy you will have in life.

You will experience hope

This is something that most people try to avoid for some odd reason. Maybe they feel as if having hope leads to failure. Let me tell you right here and now: you will experience the feeling of hope and it will be a beautiful thing. You will have hope for your future, for your family, and for yourself. Hope is not a bad thing to have -- it means that you have ambitions that cannot be taken away from you. A sense of hope is a sense of purpose.

You will fall in love

Last but not least, you will experience love. This doesn’t have to be a significant other. Love is when you care for someone and would do anything for that person. This could be a friend, a professor, or a significant other. You will both find love and fall in love. These are two different things. There are all kinds of love out there. On your journey, it is up to you to find love naturally. I have a sense of love for everyone I know. Some more than others, but I surely have learned what love is while in college.

Here marks the end of my spiel for you. You are not handed a diploma at graduation, but the key to your future. Use it wisely because you only get one key and it goes to many things. Make sure you let people into your life. Make sure you express your wisdom with the world in a way that is not boastful. Make sure you are happy with wherever life takes you. If you’re not happy, change what you're doing. Your life and how you go about it is your choice. You will most likely experience a majority of things on my list above, but don't let the bad experiences take away from the good. At the end of the day, you can be anyone you want to be. I applaud you on your accomplishments throughout high school and hope that you continue following your goals and dreams after that gown is stashed away somewhere safe. As you leave this letter behind, you may forget about it or even remember it years down the road. I hope that you hold onto the experiences you feel and cherish them. You only get this time once in your lifetime. Enjoy it while it lasts and make memories.

Sincerely,

Your Friend Who Is Navigating Her Way Through College