Welcome to Spooky Season. Here are some songs that give me Stranger Things vibes and remind me of the leaves changing.
October by Alessia Cara
I actually saw her in concert and she was really energetic, I think this song is the perfect transition from warm falls to crisp autumns. The first of this summer is the end of summer and a start to a new beginning.
Ahead of Time-Edit by Baltra and Park Hye-jin
I don’t know how I came across this song, but I’m glad I did. It is a Korean song, but reminds me of either old school Big Bang or Indie pop. Park Hye Jin is a Korean DJ that remixes a deep bass with a lot of different melodies. Listen when on a drive with a wicked sunset.
HEAVEN BELONGS TO YOU by BROCKHAMPTON
The world’s greatest boy band is back with a new album. I love how ridiculous this album is and the mix of sounds. The bass on this track reminds me of the deepness of fall. Good for walking around admiring the cool air.
Nothing Compares by Marc E. Bassy
Gives off total Stranger Things vibes. The beginning with the synths and bass throughout the song remind me of the original soundtrack from the Netflix show.
You are going to be learning and teaching things for the rest of your life and I think this book does a good job in talking about why that’s important. Going into college you learn to value community and that’s what this book really focuses on.
Don’t wait until your 30’s. You’re 20’s are a unique opportunity to create healthy habits for the rest of your life. Work on your life with rigor. Get in shape now, work on your relationships now. Don’t waste your time on waiting for your 30’s for your life to get better, enrich your 20’s with experience.
“Whether you are a Christian or not, I think it is valuable to have read the Bible before college.” I had a professor write that in his syllabus and especially if you want to go into politics/law or literature it is extremely valuable to go into college having read what the basic themes of the Bible are. Read it like a story.
As shocking as this dystopian world is, it is important to see the themes of women’s rights being tackled in this book and the parallels between Gilead and the current political state we are living in.
I hope you read this in high school but if you lived in Biloxi, Mississippi and didn’t read it. This classic talks about social inequality, the values of education, and laws practiced by a society. I think this is one of those books you need to read at different life stages: high school, college, dating, married, and with children. Your perspective of the book is bound to change with your own life experiences.
Professor Kendi is opening up the conversation to not only be aware of our own racism, but how we can foster a society that seeks justice and equality.
He is a professor at my school and runs the Antiracist Research & Policy Center
A story about 4 generations of a Korean family. As a Korean American, I couldn’t stop thinking about this book. It sparked a lot of conversations with my family. This story is a historical fiction read about the clashes between Japanese and Korean history and I think will grant some wisdom for generations to come.
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I had the privilege to hear her speak at my school and my God, she is an incredible lady. She is teaching at Amherst College this year!
Applicable ways to build tenacity. I read this my junior year of high school with my entire family. Here’s a book that gives you the secret to success.
Trust me, I hated this book in high school because I had to read it for Theory of Knowledge (S/O to the IB nerds out there) but I think it does get you thinking about a lot of things you will experience in college. Like what boundaries come with freedom? What do you really find important in your life? What are you willing to sacrifice in order to survive? I think it is a compelling way to tell a story.
Since I’m going into my third year of college, I think I have this moving-in thing down. Here are my dorm essentials:
1. Mattress Topper
Some of you might be going to schools where they invest all their endowment into nice beds, BUT if you’re like me and you want to sleep comfortably and not be reminded you’re on a college campus go ahead and get a mattress topper. You’re going to be at school for 8 months, I recommend investing into a comfortable bed.
TIP: I always like to invest in a memory foam one and the one I have is a cooling mattress.
All the rooms I have been in must have been occupied by boys before (sorry gentlemen) because all of them have had the faint smell of cheap cologne and musk. I actually have two oil diffusers and I have gotten into the habit of filling them up before I leave for class so when I come back it doesn’t smell like mold in my room.
TIP:I get all my oils at TJMaxx or Marshalls since they are cheap
For when you’re home sick and to make your dorm feel less like a janky room and more like home
TIP: Most places can ship them to our dorm once you upload all the pictures online.
4.Baby wipes
For all the messes, spills, stains, and everything in between, baby wipes can save you. If they are gentle enough to use on a baby’s butt, they will work for anything.
TIP: don’t do this always, but for when that lounge/bathroom is too far, you can wipe down your dirty dishes with a baby wipe.
5. Storage Boxes
I got mine from Ikea and they’ve come in handy for different purposes different years. My first year I used them to store my food, last year I used them to store my PJ’s and shoes. There are a lot of uses for them and they look better than keeping all the clutter tucked under your bed or on your shelves #adulting
Winters are harsh where I go to school and when I don’t want to dish out $4 for a coffee at the school coffee shop I opt for a tea or hot chocolate in my room. It also helps when I am out of bowls (sorry Mom).
TIP: bring all the mixes for your favorite drinks when you come to school i.e. hot chocolate, instant coffee, your favorite iced tea, etc.
7. Snacks
Some of my favorite snacks are Hot Cheetos, granola, Fiber One bars (chocolate and oats flavor), and Oreos. It isn’t great to have junk food all around you, but you will definitely have times where you will not have time to eat, so don’t be afraid to some extra snacks laying around to supplement some meals or an in between class pick me up.
8. First Aid Kit
I put bandaids, IBuprofen, safety pins!!!, Pepto Bismol and alcohol wipes in a first aid kit in my room. It’s saved me on occasion and makes my mom feel better.
Don’t bring your entire life to school. You don’t have enough room for it. If you haven’t used it in the last 6 months you probably won’t use it for the next 6. Don’t underestimate how much making your living space can change your college experience.
I recently realized that more than being burnout, I think I am more restless from feeling unfulfilled in my life.
I wasn’t really feeling passionate about anything. I was moving forward but nothing was bringing me joy. I had plenty of support and I was having a lot riches conversations, but I wasn’t sold on the things I was saying. I had ideas and a lot of creative project proposals, and didn’t really have the energy to see them through. I know I’m going to be okay, but I was feeling unsatisfied with where God was leading, mainly because I didn’t even know where I wanted to go.
I was bitter hearing of other people’s clarity and severely discouraged that I wasn’t feeling that in my own life, and sad that I wasn’t content with my life. While I was getting a little burnt out, I found comfort after talking to a girl in my life group. She was saying she wasn’t satisfied in the direction of her life. I almost cried when she said that because that is EXACTLY how I was feeling.
I was feeling really emotional after looking at this piece of art. I was walking through my school’s museum and just stood in front of this piece for a while. I couldn’t understand what drew me to this piece, but after having made it my phone wallpaper for a week it hit me. This was how i was feeling the last couple months.
I was stuck in the inner rectangle wanting every line to fall perfectly in line. I found comfort in everything being in my hands and in my control. I felt safe not stretching myself because what was within my boundaries were enough for me. Everything was as it was supposed to be, nothing more and nothing less. Once the lines started deviating from those prescribed directions I thought they were supposed to be going, I got really overwhelmed.
Suddenly after taking a step back, it wasn’t chaos but order that God was bringing into my life.
There were some things that I didn’t understand, but there were more things that started to make more sense. When you get a different perspective on your life and step back more often than not, you can see that there was a bigger picture in store for you. After looking at this picture, I sobbed. If I could, I wish I could’ve hugged myself in that moment and tell myself that I was really proud of moving forward and not letting the things of the world drag me down.
I think the best thing that is helping me through this process is going back to the beginning. I want to fall in love with my life again. When I wake up for class, I want to remind myself of how lucky I am to be getting that education. On days that it’s hard to find joy in my friendships, I want to remember what brought me to that person in the first place. This life takes work and if you don’t continue to put work in, you will not get the results you want. I am resetting my goals and realigning them to what I have control over.
At first, I felt guilty for feeling like this because I am so blessed and there are a lot of things that I have that I shouldn’t be complaining about, but I was encouraged when more people around me had vocalized their struggles with this. It’s okay to not feel okay. Not knowing what you want to do is okay. Don’t let that cripple you, use it to propel you forward.
There are still things I don’t know and may not ever get the answer to, but I have come too long to give up now. I still feel restless and at times confused because of the lack of direction in my life, but I have decided to use that as the freedom to move forward without any restrictions.
Life moves on and I’m ready to move with it.
Press on, my friend, you will see the fruits soon.
I think initially people come into the school year with a new found source of motivation. I came this year with the motivation to grab this year by the horns and not let my circumstances define me. I reconciled a lot of relationships, joined more clubs, and sought out avenues that make me happy. Honestly, I’m feeling a little defeated because it’s been three weeks and I already feel myself losing momentum. I applied to internships and I’m waiting to hear back. I joined a fitness class at my school. It’s past syllabus week and I’m going into the part of the semester where getting quizzes are no longer a question. I pushed past my insecurities of being a junior doing what I felt I should’ve done my freshman year and my comfort zone. Still, I am at this point where I am doubting whether I should’ve opened myself up like this.
There are so many factors that go into getting overwhelmed, but I find that looking at the bigger picture helps.
Of all the factors I think getting burnt out comes down to unrealistic expectations of yourself and frustration (or other negative emotions) towards others. I think we all need to realign ourselves to that motivation and remind yourself of your purpose. Sometimes we drive so earnestly in one direction we get lost because we lost sight of the other deterrents in our way. We’re navigating such a big landscape at work, school, or relationships. It’s easy to misinterpret your direction if you lose your motivation. If you are going in the wrong direction with the right intent, that just means you can back track and realign yourself, but wrong direction with the wrong intent is what is detrimental to our momentum.
When you set unrealistic expectations that suddenly with a little bit more effort your life is totally going to change, that is wrong and isn’t how the world works. Things take time and although we would all like quick turnarounds, sometimes you just need to wait. I thought I was going to be writing all these cool articles and using my time to plan ideas, doing all my homework, maintaining my friendships at school, excelling at my job, getting enough sleep, and going to the gym every day. I wasn’t doing those things a month ago there’s no way that was suddenly going to change overnight. When entering into a new goal, I think you should expect exhaustion. You are going to be changing your lifestyle. Don’t expect change right away. Progress is slow but needs consistency. Instead of trying to change everything at once, I think I want to just choose one day to fix something. For example, one day to catch up on my sleep and work out, one day to crank out all my school work, and one day to channel all my energy into my friends.
I don’t want to get discouraged if I don’t get to do something. I want to take things day by day and adjust my expectations for the next. I think that’s all I can really do. Don’t go too. If you hate working out, it’s good for you to work out, but if you go to the gym 2 times a day for the the first week, your body is going to hurt. Stretch a little and ease your way into change
Losing motivation can jeopardize your priorities.
When you get burnt out, you can get really negative. I know I absorb the energy of the people around me. When you go into a day thinking it’s going to be a long hard day, you carry yourself poorly. Each and every day you need to give yourself a small and reasonable goal that helps you feel accomplished at the end of the day. For me, it’s often times reaching out to a friend that I haven’t talked to in a while, finish work early to go find a new dessert spot, or even as small as drinking all the water I needed to that day. Small goals incentivize you to work hard and energize you to reach bigger goals. The right attitude is paramount to success. Each day is a new day to reset. Remember why you’re here and what you want to accomplish. Choose one thing you have control over.
I know this all sounds super rudimentary, but sometimes we all just need a reminder of the basics. Life is a marathon not a sprint. Just keep running.
Cry. Eat that cookie. Text your mom. It’s going to be okay. Go be great.
There’s nothing like the start of something new. New year, new academic season, birthdays, but nothing’s quite as special as a new football season. I go to school in Washington DC and I am a die hard Denver Broncos fan, so here are some ways I keep the spirit across the country.
1.Rep your boys!
I dedicated a portion of my wardrobe to Broncos gear. I have something different for every occasion and I have never regretted it. Sometimes a jersey comes in handy for themed frat parties (my Superbowl jersey doesn’t get worn unless I know it’s going to be a sterile environment).
2. Find people who like football even if it’s not your team
There are 32 teams in the NFL. You’ll be able to find other fans who hate the teams you hate, if you can’t find people who love your team too. S/O to Noah who was my floormate freshman year. I wasn’t that close to him, but since he was an Eagles fan we got to talk about football when we saw each other in the halls. He would ask me how the Broncos were doing and that changed my whole football experience-to have someone to talk to.
3. Find ways to watch the game.
Whether it’s going to the nearest bar, streaming, Facetiming your family back home to have them stream the game for you, don’t miss out on what’s important to youFind ways to watch the game.
4. Use it to cure your homesickness
When I miss home there’s nothing like watching Mile High Stadium full of orange and blue. When I’m wearing my jersey like everyone else, it makes me feel like I might not be so far from home.
5. Win or lose, support your team
I’ll see my team through Superbowls and not so super seasons. Take this with pride. Keep a little bit of home with you at all times. When your team makes it celebrate, and when they are going through an off season, cheer them up regardless. No one likes a bandwagon.
Today I woke up feeling super well rested and hopeful for a day of R&R.
I walked over to the dining hall to have some breakfast. Got my go-to:spinach and onion omelette with sweet potato tots and some fruit.
I have been having some issues with my ulcers getting triggered again and I think the culprit is eggs but after a quick Google search, I’m stumped. I figured I needed to excerise and sweat some of the pain off, so I went for a quick 2 mile run to my dear friend, Hope’s, work place. Let me tell you it was HOT, well not so much as hot as it was muggy, super humid and I was regrettably wearing all black. Little Red Fox is a quaint cafe, restaurant in a quiet little residential area of DC. I went in to get a quick treat and left with a sandwich to-go. All in all, I give it a solid 8/10 for environment, service, but seating was a little tight.
I ended up walking around the area a bit and stopped at the Politics and Prose bookstore that I didn’t know was in the area and spent a good hour there. I didn’t buy anything, but I will definitely be back soon. I walked back to campus and got ready to go see my friends down at Georgetown. Weather was looking a little gloomy, but we got to have a picnic nonetheless. I got to eat my sandwich from Little Red Fox (Fox BLT) and loved it. We all had snacks and ended up perusing around G-town until we found ourselves in front of the Waterfront trying to record lighting (but failing) and talking about the downfalls of each superpower.
I came reminded of how simple and essential friendship is in college, but in life too. Even when I’m doing nothing, just the idea that I can do nothing with my friends is comforting. I was coming back to school not knowing who was going to be there with me to walk to class and enjoy meals with, but I rekindled relationships and I’m still learning that relationships take work. If you want them to last there needs to be reciprocated energy on both sides. Relationships are hard, but you need them to be human. I have had a lot of interesting and fruitful conversations with the people I spent today with, and I really wouldn’t have it any other way.
I think as college students we feel this need to have everything together, especially in a city like DC where everyone is STRESSING about their next internship or their work life. As 20 somethings I find comfort that people in their 30s-40’s still don’t know what they are doing with their lives.
Phoebe Robinson, creator of Sooo Many White Men and Two Dope Queens, was on Deep Cuts with Hasan Minaj and she was saying she thought she was going from playing around to getting a reality check that you actually need to figure things out, but jokes on you, you’re never going to have to figured out. “The word ‘should’ is not a great word to have in your vocabulary”. We all want things in our lives, but the moment we put a societal expectation that we “should” have the perfect job right out of college, or that we “should” be married by 26 is an unrealistic standard that only makes life harder for yourself.
I am currently going through a big turning point in my life. I really thought I had my whole life planned out, I knew what I wanted, and really thought I was working towards my own success. Little did I know, God had another plan for my life. I’m still working through the idea that I need to TRUST that God has some purpose for me. I think that the hardest part of this whole process is I know I’m going to be okay and it’s just part of getting to that okay and waiting for when that “okay” is going to hit. The biggest encouragement I have gotten is just to keep going and stop hoping that you will get happy once something hits, but just to be…happy. Be happy knowing your life is shifting into something more beautiful. Be happy about the small things. Just be happy to be alive and know that you are growing.
“keep going and stop hoping that you will get happy once something hits, but just to be…happy.”
This time of year can be period of exhaustion and you can get pretty burnt out, but I charge you with the hope that you have a lot of power. You were given autonomy over one body. Take care of the body you were given. Take a mental breather and just make sure you’re okay. Failure shouldn’t be crippling. There is nothing with falling, it’s staying down that’s detrimental to your health. Keep pushing.
Your breakthrough could happen tomorrow, but you’ll never find out if you don’t get up out of bed.
Coming back to school while still holding onto those summer vibes. A mix of new and old.
ARE WE STILL FRIENDS? by Tyler the Creator
The playlist was clearly named based off Tyler the Creator’s newest masterpiece, IGOR. Can you be friends with your ex? To me, this song is a question of can you reconcile things of your past for your future? Deep. I know.
306 by Honne
HONNE has been a new obsession (S/O to Liza and Esther for inspiring this new love). A spunky fresh sound that’ll put a pep in your step.
Rango II by Vulfpeck
Vulfpeck is an oldie but goodie. They are a funk group that makes unique sounds in each song. This song reminds me of my sister with the awesome bass line.
These Days by Wallows
WALLOWS is a new group to me (lead singer Dylan Minnette is Clay from 13 Reasons Why) and is one of those Urban Outfitters vibes but I still like this song cause it’s about those confusing in between relationships.
It’s been a little bit since I just finished my first week of school of my junior year at American University.
I came to school on a Sunday evening and started to unpack everything. I wanted to spend as much time at home as I could. There’s never enough time with family really. I was feeling really nervous. I was coming off the last couple weeks of summer feeling really broken and lost. I just lost a big scholarship that I was depending on to be financially independent from my parents this semester. I lost a career path that I thought I had wanted since 7th grade. I was really really lost.
On the other hand, I had gotten an internship that I had been waiting for all summer and I was feeling hopeful for the next semester. There are obviously things that are most definitely out of my hands, but my happiness and how I react to things are all within my control.
There are always going to be things that change your idea of what you’re life it supposed to be. I think the best way to mitigate that is to live every day with the motivation to find that purpose. When you’re open minded to find your purpose you just see more things that you wouldn’t otherwise notice.
I think it’s really easy to find the negative things about our lives, but it takes a lot of energy to notice the good things. I have really good professors this semester. I have the same roommate as last year so I’m coming in knowing I don’t need to stress about my housing situation. I am coming back to school with an established group of friends. Now, I am a complainer but there’s nothing good that comes from just complaining about how tired I am, how lonely I am, how bitter I am if I am doing nothing to fix that. It’s easy to be stagnant, but you aren’t growing. In the military they always tell you to never march backwards. When you make a mistake even by a little bit you need to turn around FULL 180 and move forward from there, you never regress. Always move forward. It will take more work, but you need to move forward to grow.
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