My friends and I spent most of high school counting down the days until college, eager to be at the precipice of the rest of our adult lives. We wanted to discover ourselves, independent of our sheltered home environment. I wouldn’t say I was diving headfirst into the whole “college is for reinventing yourself” cliché, but it certainly felt like the perfect opportunity to become a better version of myself.

However, in the last few months of high school, my excitement about attending college slowly transformed into dread. The complete 180 was a shocker, especially since I had put my blood, sweat and tears (and my parents’ sanity because dealing with me was no easy feat) into getting into colleges abroad. Perhaps this change was because I lacked confidence in my ability to move to the other side of the world alone — I had never been away from family for more than five days, let alone five months. I pretended these doubts didn’t exist and tried to ignore them by surrounding myself with confident people, hoping their assurance would rub off on me.

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Alas, this “fake it ‘til you make it” strategy had a big unanticipated shortcoming — I was only able to fake it until I had my confident friends by my side. The moment they started leaving for college, my confidence went out the door with them. I needed a permanent solution to become more confident and believe in myself — one that relied on me, rather than on my friends. 

I won’t keep you guessing for the solution because it’s right in front of you — the Daily Trojan. I’ve always loved writing, albeit, I did it for myself rather than for public consumption. So, I thought putting my opinions out there with the college paper would help me believe in myself. 

Yet, at the last minute, I chickened out of applying for the opinion section — the section I truly wanted to write for— thinking that the news section would be a safer bet. I was too scared by the idea of a bunch of vicious college students hunched over large computer monitors waiting to tear apart my opinions and laugh at me for having the absurd thought that I was good enough to write for them. Why would anyone care about my opinion?

Overwhelmed by this self-doubt, I spent an entire semester painstakingly writing news articles, while my heart lay elsewhere. It’s difficult taking the first step when you aren’t sure of the outcome and are trained to always think in worst-case scenarios. I somehow convinced myself that writing about topics I wasn’t interested in was better than even the remote possibility of realizing that I wasn’t good enough to write about the topics I was actually passionate about.

I finally wrote my first opinion piece during the summer, when the stakes were lower because there was no application process. One article, though, and I was hooked. I saw myself in a whole new light — someone who could frame good arguments, make witty remarks, laugh at herself and tackle headfirst topics that she wouldn’t speak about otherwise. I believed that I had something to say and maybe, just maybe, people wouldn’t mind hearing it. 

It was only onwards and upwards from there — I believed in myself enough to apply to become an opinion columnist, and it’s still hard to believe that it’s been a year since I have been regularly writing for it. This entire process has taught me that sometimes the first steps don’t have to be these gigantic leaps; you can also tiptoe forward with a small yet meaningful step and then build up from there.

As you embark on this new chapter of your life, I want you to know that taking the first step to becoming a better you is often challenging. Don’t let the fear of judgment or failure hold you back because even if the outcome isn’t what you expected, you learn a great deal about yourself during the process. You have come a long way to join our Trojan Family and you owe it to yourself to keep trying to get even further and improve yourself.