Graduating and the Future

16. May 2011 · Write a comment · Categories: Badgers, Calls from College, Chi City, Social Media
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If you graduated this weekend and did not have a single anxious thought about leaving UW-Madison, you probably:

  1. Didn’t have a life changing experience at Madison
  2. Have other pressing issues on your mind
  3. Were too hungover to think about anything beyond a toilet and two pills of ibuprofen

The emotions on campus this past week have been, for lack of a better word, interesting. Many of my friends on campus have talked about their fears of the future, their sadness of leaving best friends and the general mentality that we simply won’t be college students anymore.

I’m essentially an emotional robot on the outside and cannot cry. Do I wish I could cry – yes. Have I tried to cry – yes. Will I cry within the next two weeks – most likely not, but there’s a chance that it might happen.

Instead, my mind is in a weird state of transition that’s filled with a weird sense of optimism towards the future.  I figured that instead of telling people when they’re crying, I’d blog about it.

My mentality: yeah, graduating sucks and is painful.

The Pain

Last night, I had a run-in with a road cone at someone’s apartment (practical joke that ended up with me having a bloody nose… mom, if you’re reading this, I’m fine and you don’t need to have a panic attack.) Right now, I’m still in pain. Getting hit in the face sent a weird shock through my body and I couldn’t really think straight at the time because I thought that I had a broken nose.

Now, I’m a little swollen and bruised up, but I know that in a few days I’ll be fine and life will go on.

Graduating, in my opinion, is like a blow to your face, but it’s so much deeper. Most seniors have rooted themselves in something on campus – whether that entity is research, leadership within a student organization, being an athlete or volunteering out in the community – only to find their best friends. When you realize that those friends won’t be a two minute walk away, that’s when it hits you: oh fuck, I’m graduating and life won’t be the same. I mean – I’ve made friends this semester who have literally changed my life and I don’t know what I’ll do when I’m not in the same town as them (yes, you probably know who you are when you read that last statement).

Now I’m not talking about the friends that you see on the street and wave to while walking to class. I’m writing about those individuals to whom you can confide in; the people who’s happiness and joy reflects through your own actions; the people who don’t have the time to talk about your pressing issues but instead will MAKE time to speak with you; the friends who are your other half (yes, these people do exist and I’m not trying to be cliché.)

The Future

If I had an answer to solving the mess of leaving these friends, you’d probably know it as well and thus wouldn’t give two cents about this post. But I’ve had the chance to speak with people older than myself who shared some words of advice – I think these words continually give me the ability to not stress about the present but look forward to the future (and maybe I’m full of bullshit and will be a depressed wreck in two weeks; for right now, I’m doing fine).

My current boss at Hillel told me a few words that really shaped everything into perspective: “you’ll stay in contact and be best friends with the people who really matter to you.”

This put me into a spiral of thinking. I’ve thought, then pondered, then wondered and questioned, etc. etc about this concept. And you know what – I think it’s true. Just think about all of the people that you’ve encountered in college – you tend to gravitate and communicate with the people who become your good friends. If you communicated frequently with every person you’ve met in a class or student organization, you literally wouldn’t be able to have friends with whom you share deep emotional bonds with.

And I’ve come to a conclusion: we live in an age where communicating and staying in touch is easy. Holding on to those emotional threads that we share with our best friends – sharing the quick conversations about our days and the highs/lows of our dedication to leadership and work – they don’t have to end. We have the digital tools and technologies that make conversations and interactions almost (I’m saying almost because there will never be something quite like a deep dug or a shoulder to cry on) similar to interaction in the physical world.

Just think about it: we have (and let the list begin)

  • Facebook
  • Email
  • gChat
  • FB Chat
  • Twitter
  • Skype
  • Skype Video Phone Calls
  • Facetime Phonecalls
  • Foursquare
  • Flickr
  • Blogs
  • BBM
  • Cell Phones (okay, that seems like a given but think about 30 years ago when a phone call was confined to sitting in a home at a specific time)

 

I’m 97.68% positive that I’ve missed something in this list. Hopefully, you understand the point I’m trying to convey.

And also, you can coordinate weekends to meet up with people who live in other areas of the country. I’ve seen this with people like my brother and his friends. They’re all busy (he’s in med school, two of his other friends are in law school, his other best friend travels to and from Haiti, yada yada yada) but manage to coordinate times to meetup and have a good time. Those weekends seem to be the force that reignites their friendships, but the moments of small conversation drive their emotional connections. (editor’s note: if Southwest airlines is reading this, the company should hire me as a spokesperson and give me free travel across the country to talk about their services… I tried and now digress…)

Summing It Up

If you’ve read to this point of the blog, you obviously are a graduating senior and actually care what I’m talking about. Maybe I’m full of it and don’t know anything about the future – I don’t know. I guess the point I want to get across is that although graduating sucks, we’ll still maintain (and hopefully further develop) the relationships and friendships that have bloomed over the last 4 years. Yes, I’m going to drink the cliché Kool Aid right now and say it: once Badgers, always Badgers.

That’s all folks. Thanks for a great 8 semesters and giving me the chance to figure out my true passions in life.

PS- my nose still hurts.

 

Senior Anxiety and #SoulSearching

13. April 2011 · 1 comment · Categories: Calls from College, UW-Madison

I’ve always been a fan of registering for classes. The thrill of selecting the topics you’ll learn about for a semester – it never gets old.

Last week, I sat down to register for another semester. When I clicked the submit button on Student Center, my computer stopped working. The computer would not turn on and I panicked; no, I freaked out. My heart pounded as if pure fire and adrenaline went through my veins.

Suddenly, I realized that I wasn’t registering for classes, but instead was laying in a pile of sweat after having an anxiety-driven dream about graduation.

My dream served as a metaphor about my current thoughts: I’m nervous about graduating college and going into the “real world.”

Speaking with my friends on campus and at other schools, I’ve come to realize that worrying about the unknown future is not irregular; in fact, it’s actually quite normal.

In an interview on NPR’s All Things Considered, professor of psychology Dr. Kelly Bukeley explained the root of anxiety during times of transition in our lives.

“Well, one way to look at this is to think of what graduations are, and for many people in our society, other than weddings or funerals, a graduation is the most powerful and dramatic ritual experience they ever go through. And graduations in some ways are our society’s version of a right of passage, where we make a transition from youth to maturity. And just like other rights of passages in other cultures, graduations have aspects of an ordeal, of a trial by fire. And there’s uncertainties and our old self dies in a metaphorical way.”

So I guess what I’m afraid of is not necessarily the life I’m leaving behind at UW-Madison, but rather the uncertainty of what lies ahead.

Am I going to like my job? Will I have enough structure in my life? Will I keep in touch with my college friends? How will I function without a schedule of 2 classes per day and activities, like AKPsi or Hillel (two organizations that I’m actively involved with; you can insert your student orgs in here and get the general picture)?

And the biggest question of all: will I be happy?

For me, the anxiety has started to come in ebs and flows. This week, I presented at the Undergraduate Research Symposium regarding my study on Twitter for my senior honors thesis. As I attempted to push myself through creating PowerPoint slides, I felt my mind racing with thoughts about the future.

So, I stopped my work and went on a long run along the Lakeshore path. The clear water brushing up against the rocks had a calming effect and my mind repositioned itself.

In the true fashion of Twitter and hash tags, something that I’m quite fond of and have written about on this site before, I found myself doing something that I think all students across campus need to make time for: #soulsearching

I think that all seniors, at some point during the last few weeks, should take a step back from their chaotic UW-Madison lives to take time to think about who they were before coming to UW-Madison, how they’ve grown during their time at college and what they can do to continue their personal gains/achievements once they’re out in the real world.

Luckily, University Health Services (UHS) just rolled out a new counseling group focused specifically on coping with graduation and the transition out of college, according to the UHS website. Personally, I think this is something that students should take advantage of while they are still in the Madison area. To learn about the program, visit the UHS Counseling Groups page.

Unfortunately for myself, I don’t think that the obnoxious college dreams will be going anywhere soon. Both my parents and my brother have them, so in true Zaban fashion, I’m bound to get them as well.

Hopefully, however, I’ll have the same attitude that Bulkeley has about his own college anxiety dreams.

“And so I often wake up with that sense of – I still have this wistful desire to be in school; it was a fun, happy time for me and for many people. But I realized that’s not my place anymore. That’s not where my life is right now. “

**This post originally appeared on the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s School of Business myBiz blog.

Hey Students: LEARN HOW TO WRITE!

22. March 2010 · 5 comments · Categories: Calls from College, Just Zack

Newsflash to all college students: everyone needs strong communication skills.

I don’t care if you are a finance major, journalism student, biochemistry researcher or a kindergarten teacher- you need to have strong writing skills.

Now you’re probably asking why I’m on a rant about strong writing skills. Here’s my answer:

The past week has consisted of constant emails from neurotic freshmen in AKPsi (http://badgerakpsi.com) regarding their business school applications.

Earlier in the year, I told a few students that I would proofread their essays, giving an extra eye to their personal statements. Somehow, word spread and I’ve become the essay/resume correction whore, literally reading one essay after another.

The comment bubble: one of my best writing friends.

I’m perfectly happy with reading these applications. Actually, I’m quite fond of it. I’ve found some type of passion and joy from helping others develop the message they “want to say” versus what they “actually write.” With my revisions during the past week, however, I’ve found consistent writing “boo-boos” across all applications that corrected:

  1. Using “It Is”. Please, for the love of everything on the face of the planet, DO NOT USE “IT IS” WHEN YOU WRITE A PERSONAL STATEMENT. I believe I wrote the comment “what is the antecedent for ‘it’” 1,000,000 times. In my opinion, people essentially beat around the bush and sound unclear when they begin a sentence with “it is” or “there are”. If you are limited to 250 words for an essay or 1 page for a cover letter, you cannot leave room for ambiguity in your writing. These documents are your time to shine- don’t cloud them up with crappy writing.

    My friend knows the two words that make go crazy.

  2. Sprinkling adverbs into every sentence. You’re trying too hard if you use adverbs across your essay. Analyze your document and see if you have adverbs that you can remove without losing meaning. If you remove the adverb and rework your sentence, you’ll probably (ok, you can use an adverb when necessary) find yourself with a stronger statement. Check out this post from Novelr to see “why adverbs suck”.
  3. Using too many commas. I HATE when people use too many commas in their writing. A general rule of thumb (please note- GENERAL. English has its exceptions): if you take a pause while reading a sentence, you should insert a comma at the “pause point.” Inserting too many commas makes you sound like you have no concept of strong writing.
  4. Passive Voice X 10,000. I learned this rule in Spanish before I applied it to english: don’t use passive voice extensively in your writing. UNC has a great handout on passive voice. For students who have a strict word limit, taking out passive phrases will free up space and provide room for additional description.
  5. Writing about them, not you. Personal essays are a reflection of you, your characteristics and your past achievements. When students write about another person instead of themselves, the students walk the line of drawing attention to others. Essays are the time to shine and, in my opinion, downright brag about overcoming challenges to find success.
  6. Your story is boring. If you read over an essay and think your story is boring, it probably will make the admissions counselor or corporate recruiter have the same response. Spice up your writing. You don’t need to show that you saved a business $3,000,000 or produced an award winning ad campaign because, in reality, you have not achieved these accomplishments. Instead, focus on a slice of your life that you feel exemplifies your characteristics and passion. If you lead a committee at high school or held some type of leadership position during college, elaborate on your responsibilities and place the reader in your shoes.

This list was not a direct list of things I disliked in the essays I read (I actually enjoyed the messages found within the personal statements… great job AKPsi freshmen :) ). Instead, I wanted to highlight writing mistakes that most students can look for and remove so their writing is concise and interesting.

I don’t want to come off as a cocky student: I continually push myself to become a stronger writer. Creating a blog and writing on somewhat of a consistent basis helped me develop a “voice”. If you want to learn about setting up a blog, contact me and I’ll help you out.

If anything in the post sounds interesting, you should check out two books I’ve read that revolve around improving your writing skills. The first book Writing Tools is an easy read for anyone ranging from techy nerds to art students. The second book Working with Words is a little more advanced and acts as a handbook/reference guide to those who write often.

Writing Tools by Roy Clark

Working With Words by Brian Brooks

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