Reflecting On Four Years: Senioritis

 

   It's hard finding yourself surrounded by seas of copy-and-paste teenagers.

As a senior in Highschool, one thing I’ve learned after four years is how to navigate your way around the intimidators and social pressure. I’ve always been the ambiverted type: not taking risks, keeping with the same social circle and using my intuition to find my way out of difficult situations. But at seventeen years old – the last thing I need is to not take risks. Following the crowd has always been my default option, it’s time to unlearn that. 

Going into freshman year, peer pressure was at an all time high. It didn’t matter how many times I had been the scrawny kid in school getting picked on, I slowly became that person I hated and worse. I thought that’s what made me “cool”. I thought that was the only way to make friends and get invited to the biggest parties. By the end of ninth grade, I knew I was living a lie, and I didn’t want to be that person anymore. So that summer before sophomore year, I made a commitment to become my truest self. 

I suddenly changed my name to “Jazz”, as my birth name felt like it was no longer fitting for me. The name made me think of a saxophone, flashy and booming. Known for the 1920s genre, it reminded me of the Great Gatsby. Jazz sounded like a girl from New Orleans, dressed in glitter and gold, dancing at a Gatsby’s party. She smells like fireworks and tastes like champagne. Jazz wore pastels and pink everyday to school, was kind to everyone and focused on her schoolwork. That's the girl who I wanted to be, and so, that's who I became.

 

But I didn’t realize then, at fifteen going on sixteen, that undoing all my past wrongs wouldn’t be that easy. On the outside I was finally the girl who I always wanted to be, but the inside of me was in turmoil. Throughout tenth grade I noticed I would often be sensitive to negative feedback, self-sabotage, reluctant to seek support and constantly finding myself in tedious love triangles I couldn’t find my way out of. In hopes that I would no longer be seen as the judgy, bossy girl from freshman year – I instead played into a ditzy-airheaded character to make myself less intimidating. And it cost me. 

I found myself constantly searching for male validation and giving the same ordinary guy a million chances that he didn’t deserve. With an emotional sophomore year coming to a close, junior year quickly approached, and this summer – instead of focusing on my appearance, I needed to look inward. I learned that I’m a perfectionist and an overachiever, with a fear of failure and abandonment.  I am creative and imaginative but at times unrealistic and holding in my emotions. I’m passionate about self-expression but may feel a sense of emptiness. I studied each and every part of myself, every trait and scar – not only accepting the best and worst parts of myself, but learning to love them all. 

Now seventeen years old, and a senior in high school, I am the best version of myself I’ve ever been. I’m confident, more outgoing and finally cut ties with every person and thing that no longer serves me. I imagine that I still have a long way to go, but for the first time in a long time, I’m willing to grow.