With internships and vacations coming to a close, I guess it's safe to say that our beautiful summer is coming to a close. Even though we all did different things and went to different places, we all pretty much did the same thing this summer; we learned a lot about ourselves and the world around us. I know I did.

Although I didn't do anything as glamorous as go to a foreign country or work at an internship somewhere, I had the experience of being somewhere new. For the summer I've been staying in Houston, Texas. I lived here when I was a kid, but everything felt so odd and unusual for me. From the people to the set up of living, I didn't know what living in Houston was like anymore, and getting around the city and finding things to do was my adventure. Houston was most definitely not my first choice for summer vacations, but I'm glad that I came here because I doubt that I would've learned all that I have while being here.

Being here forced me to make my own fun. So I spent most of my time retaining a lot of information. Information about film, life, and other random things that I found on the internet. And I'm going to share three things that I learned this summer that everybody needs to know and keep in the back of their minds.

1. YOU ARE YOU'RE OWN PERSON

I know that we've all probably heard this a few times but do we really understand the full extent to how true that statement is? Take a minute and really thing about what it means. To be in control of your own life. TO BE IN CONTROL. You can literally do whatever it is that you want. Whatever you want! You can move to a foreign country, write a book, go to school, start a business, ANYTHING. As long as you have the means to obtain and/or do something, you can do whatever your heart desires. For me that's huge because I'm so used to being in a controlling environment that the knowledge of knowing that I can do whatever I want with my life is huge! It's liberating and SSSOOOOO refreshing to know that I'm an adult, I can do what I please. I can go after what I want regardless of what other people say and think. That's huge.

2. DON'T LET THE FEAR OF MAKING THE WRONG DECISION KEEP YOU FROM MAKING A DECISION

This is something that cannot be stressed enough. For me, just like many of you, decision making is hard. IT'S HARD. Circumstances in my life made it impossible for me to really have a go at the whole "make a decision" sort of thing. Things were always decided for me and now I usually struggle if I want to order a pizza or get Chinese food. And sometimes when I feel like I'm being rushed to make a decision and I don't know how to make one. I get so consumed with having all of the factors in front of me that I eventually don't make a decision at all, and that's not the way to be. We have to make decisions for ourselves in life because nobody knows what's best for you except for you. If we continue to allow ourselves to live in fear, we'll never live.

3. FAKE IT 'TIL YOU BECOME IT

I learned about this from this amazing TED talk that you should check out right here. Everybody knows the phrase, "Fake it 'til you make it", but the woman in this talk, Amy Cuddy, talks about faking it until it actually becomes you. In the video she talks about how our body language not only has an affect on other people but how it affects us and how we feel about ourselves. By practicing body poses that exhibit confidence and power, it changes how a person feels about themselves over time. As a person who really hates to get out their comfort zone and has many moments of insecurity, I really want to try this and I encourage other people to do the same. Changing yourself for the better isn't a bad thing, it's just a sign of growth.

I am so grateful for the opportunities that came my way this summer, the people I met, and the experiences that I had, regardless if they were good or bad. Every piece of information that I have absorbed this summer are the pieces that I needed to realize that I'm not just a person who does things for rewards or to get to a certain point in life, but I do the things I want in life because I want happiness and I want to attain happiness by living by my rules and doing what I think is best for me. Because right now in my life, I'm what's important. I want everybody to remember that they are important and that they must be the most important thing in their life. If you don't remember that and determine what's best for you, who will?