The dreadful middle school yearbook: the hair, the makeup, the clothing, the braces. We all remember the regrettable time that was the sixth through eighth grade. Sitting back, years later, we understand that we probably shouldn't have layered on the black eyeliner or dyed our hair all colors of the rainbow. Though it may make us cringe and hide in shame, it provides a comedic yet helpful lesson. Those years helped to form who we were in high school and the years after. We often ask what would we have told the younger versions of ourselves.

At the ripe old age of 18 I no longer dye my hair purple, however I do believe in self expression. Dying your hair unnatural colors is like the pre-teen way of establishing who you are. Though middle school was a struggle for most people; figuring out how to stand on our own and fighting through the awkwardness, we learned some things. We learned that we were either cut out for the goth life or not, we tried all the different sports and lunch table groups. Basically middle school was a giant test run for the over-exaggerated life that was high school.

When I think of high school I think of Mean Girls; when I think of my high school I think of sports, academics and friends. High school is all about prioritizing. The first report card you got back from high school proved this to be true. High school holds the widest age range of all public schooling; in four years you change so much. We go from the former middle schooler limbo to applying to college with our driver's license and a summer job. We go in so naïve and graduate with knowledge greater than what the diploma justifies. We learned how to communicate with friends, teachers and bosses/coaches. We discovered the classes we didn't like and the ones we did. We learned how to be leaders through sports and clubs. We grew in personal relationships and ultimately developed our own perspective on life.

So these small decisions, these things from our past, how do they make us who we are now? That is all dependent upon how you look at it. If you look back at your excessive use of black eyeliner and question what you've been like had you kept it up, you still have some "soul searching" to do. Our decisions are basically what have made us today. If you are unhappy with who you are now, you can't continue to blame the former version of yourself. Instead you have to consider what you can do now to remake yourself. The you that you are now, is not the you that you were then, nor will you be the same in the future. So tell this to yourself, your past, your current, your future, you can be reborn; so create yourself.