So This is What the End Feels Like

So here I am at the end of my career here at Punahou. Suddenly I find myself full of uncertainty and doubt. "Will I be able to survive and be successful in the "real world" with the academic skills I've accumulated at Punahou? What about my lack of street smarts? Did I get everything I wanted to out of my costly and superior education?" College looms nearer than ever--I just received my housing, food, and orientation forms--and I cannot even begin to percieve what is ahead for me. But what am I suppose to think? I haven't been to a new school in over a decade, I rarely interact with people outside of Punahou (not because I'm stuck up but because I don't have the chance), and I've never been to a public school. All I know of the real world is what I hear from my parents, my public school tennis friends, and what I read. If its hard to understand how slow I am at learning about what things are "really like", consider this: I only found out that people have sex, do drugs, and drink alcohol when I was late in my freshman year. It was so hard for me to understand how people could still be doing all of that when we had so much preparation and warning from grade 4! Remember all of those sex, drugs, and alcohol videos we had to watch? The ones about puberty and how we should "be safe", "abstinence is the best policy", and "don't do drugs"? I always believed that that was enough to keep any kid from experimenting--apparently I was wrong. That is probably just one example of my naivety. Remembering this example, among others, does nothing for my confidence. College is a whole new world from what I've been living in. I'm definitely not worried about the many temptations that are going to try and get into my head, I'm worried about staying focused in school. I used to have a tendency to procrastinate (I think I still do). That, coupled with the fact that college is a huge step up from high school, causes me to worry if I'm ready for college life. I haven't had the opportunity to speak with my parents about college yet and I'm sure the conversation is going to come up sooner or later. Will they discover that I'm not as fit as they thought to live life on my own? Punahou has undoubtedly prepared me for higher levels of academia, but should they be held accountable for helping us adjust to college life? It doesn't seem likely. All they can do is release us to our respective colleges and well-wish us that we chose the most appropriate place to get a start on the rest of our lives. There are self-help books and the advice of our elders to rely on but our succcess relies on ourselves. We are ultimately the change we wish to see in our worlds. We must look at the situation logically and realistically and realize that college will determine, to a certain extent, how successful we are in life. Am I mature enough to realize this now? Will it finally dawn on me how serious the time is when I get there? Who knows what the future holds, but one thing is certain: I have never been one to take new situations in stride. I'm sure you've all witnessed how long it takes for me to transition to new situations. I don't like uncertainty--if I had to design a world to live in, I'd eliminate the anxiety associated with not knowing for sure. This tells me something about myself, right? I'm impatient, slightly type A, and definitely stubborn. Sometimes I think I'm self confident but my actions in tight situations show otherwise. Who am I at this crossroad between success and failure? A Punahou education does not guarantee success in college and success in college is not always indicative of success in life. Who will I become, based on my personality and my character. I ask these questions of myself because I know that I need to get them out in the open. I have to recognize and react to what is ahead on the quickly approaching end of the horizon. Thank you to Punahou, thank you to all who have helped me, thank you God for getting me through all of this, and good luck to myself. Can I conquer what I can't answer? Addressing the problem is the first step to making it work so it can't be too bad that I dedicated a post to confronting myself...