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| Hand-made stole for BBA! |
Happy Wednesday! This is Rei, I hope everyone is doing well with life and everything else. We are now in May, which means that final exams and summer break is just around the corner. Congratulations on almost finishing up another school year! For me, as a senior year student, I just finished my Capstone presentation (senior project) yesterday and it means that graduation is less than a month away! I've spent four years of college at PLU living on campus, since Fall 2020 to this Spring 2024. For my last blog, I would like to share 5 things in total I've learned during my four years of college life with some of the graduation pictures I've got with my roommate. I hope it will be beneficial to those of you who have a few years left in PLU!
Life Tip - inside of College
1. Time Management is everything
You probably have heard this a lot from your parents, professors, and etc., but this is true! In college, especially if you live on campus, a ton of planning will take place. I would say, if you figure out how you manage your time schedule, you win the game. And most importantly, utilize your Google Calendar! She has been my best friend ever since I've started using her, managing my schedule, share some activities' schedule with my friends/professors. I personally prefer the online calendar form because they visualize my plans well and let me think what I can do during the time I don't have anything, just makes me productive!
2. Do not compare yourself to others, compare yourself to you in the past
Sometimes, comparing with someone else can be a motivation to do something better. I would say this is a recipe for unhappiness. In a different words, Social Comparison gives you a sense of rush, stress, and negative feeling eventually. Especially for those of you who are from outside of Unites States, living away from your family, you are already doing amazing! You should be proud of yourself from just breathing in the different country from where you are from. There was a time I was disappointed/stressed to myself that I was taking a longer time than other students to understand and complete all the things I had to get done. After keep feeling stressed, at one point, I stopped thinking of things that way and started to think it's okay to not be capable of doing everything at 100%. No one in this world is perfect so I should focus on myself rather than comparing myself to others. As long as YOU know what you like about yourself, your weakness and are trying to improve them, you will be the best version of yourself by the time you graduate from college.
3. Be adaptable to the culture here, but still be yourself
What I found most important is not trying to be someone else even in the new country with new surrounding environments. Adapting to the culture of where you are at is great, and it can be a main goal of studying abroad for some of the international students. And PLU has a variety of opportunities for you to absorb new cultures, new values, with new people. However, learning new things does not mean you are being away of how you are used to be. For instance, your English will probably improve year by year as you continue studying in the United States, but there is no need to change your 'personality.' How you feel about certain things, how you behave towards others, and how you are, are all core things about yourself that you should not ignore.
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| A little pretty path right next to Hauge Admin Building! |
Life Tips - outside of College
1. Always have a Plan B (and Plan C if needed)
I love United States, I love how people are friendly, and I appreciate that I was able to study in this country for four years. One aspect of culture that we have here that I learned was people are loose on time, compared to my home country - Japan, at least. Let's say you order something online for a certain event, but you have to order really ahead of time to ensure that whatever you are ordering will arrive before the event you have. Thus, again, managing your schedule and doing things ahead of time is key. Living in the United States for four years really trained me in the aspect of this, which I appreciate. If I kept living in Japan for my entire life I wouldn't know how to manage these things. I believe these skills will help you a lot not only when you are in college but also once you start working in the future no matter what country it will be.
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| Some lavenders at PLU Golf Course |
Not just during the years in college, but if you are living your life, things change gradually and suddenly at the same time. Maybe it's a good change, sometime it can be changes you did not expect it to be. You might have a breakdown caused from these changes - yet, it's okay! Everyone has experienced this all the time. How I cope with any big negative changes of my life is to think my life as a roller coaster. I know it sounds weird but I believe that when something negative happened, that means something better is coming after, as the roller coaster goes up after they fall down. You will never be stuck in your down-bad moment, so might as well enjoy the process of going to the positive phase! Something I appreciate about the US culture is that people are open to share what happened to them even though it is something that affects them negatively. People share when and why they cried, felt sad/angry, how they felt about it, and people are willing to listen. Talking it out with others is definitely a life tip when it comes to handling your changes and people are more than happy to help!
And these were all I could think of as of now! Looking back over the past four years, there have been ups and downs, but I believe it has been an unforgettable period of my life and I have learned tons of life skills. I am so grateful to have met Heather and Brandon, International Services, and all of the international students. I hope that you, the international students reading this, whether you are a prospective student or a current student, will be glad that you chose PLU when you graduate as well!
Until next time,
-Rei
