At the beginning of the school year, I felt lost. I needed to completely rearrange my classes, apply to jobs I was uncertain about, rediscover my place at Boston College after six months abroad, make amends with someone, and spend time with the friends I love while also trying to meet new people. For the first time in my life, I wasn’t able to compartmentalize my rising anxiety and still be present. I found myself feeling disconnected, with one foot in and one foot out of college life.
One day, as we walked across the Quad, a friend asked me, “What’s weighing on you?” I smiled and played it off, feeling like the turbulence in my mind couldn’t be released into the breeze of a sunny day. A couple of days later, my friend reminded me, “You never answered my question.”
At first, I couldn’t find the words to articulate the noise inside my head. I also felt silly complaining when I was incredibly blessed with good health, a top-tier education, and wonderful family and friends. Nonetheless, I started to explain my sense of being left behind, of coming back to campus and feeling like my time was up.
At this point, tears welled up in my eyes, and I finally admitted, “I feel like I’m doing everything wrong.” He thought for a moment, then pointed out some of the involvements, people, and personal growth that had made my time at BC so meaningful. As I listened to him, I felt the layers of confusion and self-doubt begin to peel away. He completely flipped my uncertainty—I went from clawing out of quicksand to enjoying the challenge of scaling a mountain.
One of the powers of conversation is the opportunity to address your fears. Worried you’ve become too comfortable alone? You get to go on dates, flirt, dance, and talk—you get to choose who you love. Scared you’ll hate your job? Please. As if your first job is your only job. You get to choose a path, gain experience, and pivot if it isn’t the right one. Not communicating with others? Set aside just 30 minutes once a week to answer texts and return any missed calls. Worried you won’t be happy? The great thing is that every day is a chance to start anew.
My friend reminded me to see uncertainty as an opportunity. Even being completely, embarrassingly honest with someone lifted a huge weight off my chest.
That same week, I talked to another friend about how the job search was going. She described a conflict between wanting to return home to the Pacific Northwest and staying in New England, having come to love Boston during her time here. She didn’t regret switching coasts but wondered if she should have stayed closer to home to avoid the question entirely. I laughed as I realized we were facing exactly opposite dilemmas and flipped it around.
I explained how I had decided to stay close to home and now don’t know whether to stay in Boston or listen to the nagging feeling that it’s time to explore a new place. As my favorite poet and A-list cornball, Pitbull, would say, “The grass always looks greener on the other side … till you get to the other side.” The irony is that even if my friend had stayed home, she might very well still be facing a different but equally difficult question. We have to focus on doing what feels right in the present moment.
Conversations like these ease isolation and confirm that we all have big questions, but, of course, other conversations can be very counterproductive.
In the days before the recent presidential election, a friend said, “I’m stressed for next week. I’ve discovered things about some of my friends that just might make me like them a little less.”
I grew up in a conservative-leaning Hispanic family while attending an all-girls school in Massachusetts. As I wrestled with the differing perspectives between these two facets of my life, I started asking tough questions of both my friends and family members. Even within my own family, I was surrounded by highly intellectual, good, and loving people who strongly disagreed with each other. Yet, the discussions remained respectful, rooted in a genuine exchange of information and opinions.
My friend described how gatherings between her liberal immediate family and her mom’s conservative extended family often turned into verbal attacks rather than discussions. The conversations weren’t about understanding, but about hurling labels like “snowflake,” with the underlying goal being, “Let me tell you why you’re wrong.”
After hearing that, I better understand why my friend and I react differently to someone voting differently than we do. I have also gained a new level of appreciation for her introspection and curiosity.
The incredible diversity of life experiences among American voters, coupled with the wide range of issues that inform their voting choices, leads people to prioritize certain issues they feel most strongly about. It takes courage to examine your own biases and, ultimately, to see beyond a point of disagreement and understand the full scope of a person’s worldview, which is based on life experience.
But modern politics carries a fear that clashes with our innate desires to be liked and fit in with our peers. There’s a prevailing belief that if we disagree on a political matter, we must be fundamentally different—I must hate what you love and you must love what I hate.
This is usually false. People who disagree with each other tend to overestimate their differences and greatly underestimate their similarities. In her TED Talk, “How Curiosity Will Save Us,” Mónica Guzmán says, “Whoever is underrepresented in your life, will be overrepresented in your imagination.”
While single, the perfect partner may be overrepresented in your imagination. If you’re a regular runner on the second floor of the Plex, the lifting equipment and its users on the third floor may seem intimidating and overrepresented in your mind. For an atheist whose close friends are all atheists, religious people might be overrepresented as narrow-minded or exclusive. When lonely, the idea of the perfect friend group can be overrepresented.
It’s so easy to cling to our beliefs and preconceived notions when they’re never challenged by the people around us, or to use them as a crutch to explain areas of our lives we’re unhappy with. It is our duty to engage civilly and respectfully with people we disagree with. We have a responsibility to be proactive in the search for personal and social fulfillment.
If we are honest with ourselves, speak openly with others, and make an effort to surround ourselves with those who are curious about our lives, we will live in a far more peaceful and happy society.
