When I first moved to St. Cloud, I was extremely anxious and worried about making friends and “fitting in” because if I wasn’t, I would be “lonely in school”. I had a fear of becoming the odd one out, of becoming a loser, and not being recognized for the person I present myself to be. In the beginning I had a clouded mindset, and I didn’t give myself the change to try out things because I cared about what other people thought of me. But looking back to my younger self, I realized how fitting in and comparing myself to others was a scam. As basic as it sounds to say, “just don’t care”, even the smallest things such as saying hi or eating could be nerve-wracking. If you’re constantly thinking that people are watching…you’ll put so much pressure on yourself to be this specific person. Sometimes the pressure and unnecessary stress comes from your own conscience, but rationally, it’s up to you to decide what person you want to be. You control whether or not outside influences affect you, and with that you take responsibility for your emotions.

Anxiety isn’t very welcoming…Loss of sleep, lack of school, decline of health, how am I supposed to feel happy with that? The importance of having a healthy positive mindset will help you take control of these obstacles firsthand. At first, changing the way you think could be a challenge, when you have to ignore the “what ifs” and look more on the brighter side when you’re oblivious. You may think that looking more on the negative side could help you avoid certain situations, because thinking the worst will give you a mental advantage to avoid the risks. But this automatically puts you in a stance to not take a chance before you even tried. Although you worry constantly there is a way to beat the game. Yes, having anxiety isn’t a thing you can simply get rid of and be free of it from the rest of your life because humans naturally think about these things. Being afraid and worried is a natural feeling that could be overwhelming, but there’s a better way to regulate it rather than constantly thinking negatively. It’s short and simple verbally, it’s going to be okay…and you don’t HAVE to worry. But you will. The answer is having a hopeful mindset, and the ability to BELIEVE that what you’re negatively worrying about won’t happen, along with avoiding the pride. The world may be full of rotting cupcakes, but you don’t have to keep eating them. Make new cupcakes and…and the beautiful thing about this is that even if you eat the cupcakes, you they have been rotten before. The positive mindset isn’t about sugar coating and completely ignoring the bad things what could or did happen to them previously, but about acknowledging and accepting that you believe that they can or could not be rotten cupcakes. Same with anxiety, you don’t automatically think it will or won’t happen, but you hope for the good with the belief that it can still be bad. You can live in this sweet world with anxiety, but not in an ostracized manner…again…the pressure is on.

Schoolwork is one of the many things that gave me anxiety and stress because I had a fear of becoming an academic failure. When I first started Dual Enrollment in my freshman year, I was positive and cheerful about the fact that I was getting ahead, but it put so much tension because since I was getting ahead, I had a certain goal to achieve. The idea of going off campus one day was nice to picture in my head because that would add independence to me, I would be able to have my own system. But at one point, I started giving up because I started to shift into a negative mindset about my academic life. I started thinking that none of it matters because “I don’t have to worry about it now”…”Grades don’t define me”, and the biggest one, “I’ll be fine in the future”. But the solution isn’t completely dropping it all. Your grades don’t define you, but your work ethic does. And that’s where the principle of motivation comes in. Procrastinating by itself is having a negative mindset, even if you don’t realize it. Thinking that you could do it later puts you at a disadvantage because you limit yourself on the elements of taking initiative. With thinking that you could push it off, you think that you can’t complete things as soon as you get them. There is pressure there…but ultimately, it’s not life threatening in in this context. All of the gas put in the work you do now is just disposed into the future. So, there’s pressure…the reason teens are urged to take these classes because of the way society is evolving, and costs are going to come into play for life and an education. But who’s worried about that…It’s the present! Focus on your high school classes and passing those first and determine whether or not you’re ready and prepared to take on the extra weight. Overtime you may get better prepared, but the most you can do mentally is being optimistic and considering the possibility to become your own academic weapon. The key is to try smarter, not harder, and overcoming anxiety is all about being open to use that power.

But what if I overthink about using that power and not using that power and why I’m thinking about not using that power and thinking about why I’m thinking about that. Questions…and what are the possible effects of having an overthinking mindset? Less sleep. Some teens may stay up super late due to schoolwork, mental problems, or just because they think of what would happen if they slept. For some, it seems easy to program your body to operate off of 4 hours of sleep, but a lack of sleep could have some bad side effects. You might make mistakes that you don’t even see, act a certain way you wouldn’t because of your state of mind, and it puts a defect on your daily function. It’s crucial that you get a good amount of sleep because overall, it improves your mental health, you’re happier because your body feels rested, you calmed your mind and avoided that possible mental breakdown you could’ve had a 2 AM. For me, overthinking is the #1 thing that deprives me from sleep. From all the anxiety, my mind was drawn into a scribble of random thoughts put into bad scenarios because of my negative mindset. Critiquing yourself every single day on every single thing will swallow your sanity because you broke your persona, or you acted out of character. Note to self: not everything is black and white. There’s going to be mistakes and imperfections in your daily life, and no one is going to remember that one embarrassing thing you did back in the day. And remember, high school is TEMPORARY…as much as it seems that you live there for a long time, it’s just the beginning…or it could be the end.

But anyways…anxiety seems like it’s a big thing to overcome, but starting with small steps can lead to a great leap to keep it under control. Having a positive mindset is also an important thing to have equipped with you, either if you’re about to enter high school or going out…one of my biggest pieces of advice is to find independence in yourself. I’m not telling you to completely isolate, but to find happiness in yourself, not in other people. Making yourself happy could probably be one of the greatest things you could ever do for yourself. Constantly pleasing other people and excessively worrying about what could happen, you lose yourself. You forget how to make yourself happy, because all of your life you’ve been following other people…and if you’re in that current situation there’s a way out of it. Don’t rush…and take your time in your personal and academic journey. Yes, chase that dream you’ve been wishing for, but don’t chase that dream if you know that dream isn’t looking for you. Don’t think too much about it but think about it enough that you understand your situation. And remember you are NOT alone on this anxiety train…everyone experiences some type of anxiety one point in their life, especially in high school! So in summary, once you learn how to be alone and conquer your anxiety, you won’t have to worry about people or things accepting you. Because if you accept yourself, sky’s the limit.