By Kimiko Martinez
It seems like a majority of students on campus just don’t get it. I know it sounds cliché and motherly, but you really ought to enjoy these years.
As I see this semester of the Graphic come to a close, I’m realizing how quickly time passes by and its simply a struggle to get through the day-to-day grind. But if you don’t find your solitude and joy during these years, when will you?
Believe me, the real world isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. And although getting that first 9-to-5 job (really more like 8-to-6 if you’re fortunate) can be really exciting, unless you’ve luckily landed in career heaven, that feeling starts to fade fast after the honeymoon period wears off. And before you know it, you’ve lost that loving feeling and it’s gone, gone, gone. Oh-oo-oh-oo oh.
So at the risk of sounding way too parental, I’m going to give you a couple of self-help-type strategies for living to make the most of whatever time you’ve got left here at Pepperdine.
• Don’t work. If you can do without the extra cash and live on whatever financial aid (whether it be university or parentally funded), do it. Maximize time with friends and family and form those relationships that you’re going to remember later in life. They’re invaluable. (But don’t forget to do your homework, too.)
• Learn to budget and live simply within your means, saving enough money for those rainy days Mom always told you would pop up, because they do. And when it rains, it pours, so make sure you have more than a pretty penny tucked away for such emergencies.
• Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. You know, God was onto something when he took a day off. And he knew that his creation would someday end up being a workaholic culture that crammed their days full of meetings and memos, work and working out. So take the advice of those 10 thingies Moses brought down from that mountain and make sure you give yourself a day off to relax and recharge. It’s the best thing you can do for yourself in the long run.
• Try everything. So you really want to see what underwater basket weaving is like? Take a class. Check out community college offerings that spark your interest and see what it’s all about. College is a time to clarify what you want to do with your life so take this time to figure it out. Because if you don’t do it now, you’re going to be spending the rest of your life trying to find the time to figure out what you really want.
• Don’t buy into the Hollywood notion of a happy ending. Movies are like life, but they’re not life. Love isn’t the end all and be all of life. While you may think you’ve found “The One,” and start uttering Jerry Maguire-esque phrases like “You complete me,” real love is more than just a feeling and takes hard work. And no one person is going to completely fill that space in your life — that’s what friends are for.
–Got a gripe? E-mail Kimiko Martinez at kimiko.l.martinez@pepperdine.edu
November 14, 2002