Dear fellow academias, nerdy engineers, hopeful future doctors, lawyers, movers, and shakers of the world, college students enduring the final round of hunger games (higher education edition), this is your reality check:

It’s finals week, and you’re all stressed to the brim of your intellectual capacity. You have 4 exams, 3 papers, a thesis proposal, research presentation, and 99 other things you’d rather do, all weighing you down like an anchor strapped to your waist. You’re stressed, and you’re anxious. You may be at your breaking point, and if you’re like I was this morning, you may be crying into your morning Americano at the Starbucks in the city’s center over the fact that your life is just a shitshow extravaganza right now. If you’re depressed, if you’re overwhelmed, if you’re finding it hard to be a human right now, know you’re not alone. If you feel like your life will end if you get a B-in freshman Physics, just please, take a moment, step back, and be grateful for this stress. Be grateful that you’ve been granted the honor to stress about arbitrary letters (A+ B- C+ D- F+) on an arbitrary piece of gilded construction paper (undergraduate degree) which, I promise, will NOT prevent you from living another day, another year, or for that matter, a long, loving and fulfilling life.

Look at all the little things that make you happy, and cherish and embrace that happiness for a while. Realize that life is precious, sacred, and short, and whatever may be the stressor of the day, it too shall pass. “This too shall pass.”

You are more fortunate than a majority of the world, and though your struggles are real, believe me I know, they are the hopes and dreams of so many less fortunate than you, remember, the things you take for granted, someone else is praying for.