Sanity in one part

"I don't know exactly what I want to do, but I do know the type of life that I want to live."

I'm not yet a senior in college but I want that to be the first sentence of what is a tradition, perhaps an overly sentimental one, at Warren Wilson College. It captures the essence of what college ought to be. We should have a grounded experience; we shouldn't be going anywhere with what we're learning, and we shouldn't in my way of looking at things emerge fundamentally different from when we started.

I think we should preserve what was good with us when we started college, and when we graduate we should have a fuller idea of our world, and the way that we can interact with the world to shape a place that we feel we can live in. That is all I want out of college: the tools to make my life and my world a suitable place. It is a training ground, where we can emerge with those tools. And if we emerge with those tools, then college is a success, regardless of other factors. And if we emerge without the wherewithal and the confidence to shape the world, both at large and our own small world, then college was not successful.

So far I haven't satisfied my goal for college, to emerge with the tools that I need. So I have another year, and I will apply myself confidently to reach that goal. Whatever details along the way are important but not as important as the mindset that has a goal and works ardently toward it.