The start of a new semes­ter means a fresh start and a new adventure.

With the new begin­ning comes the stress of mov­ing in, buy­ing books, print­ing sched­ules, find­ing build­ings, and adjust­ing to life in a dif­fer­ent place. It is not nec­es­sar­ily an easy adjust­ment to make and for some peo­ple it’s flat out terrible.

College is not for every­one and I can promise that your classes will be more dif­fi­cult than they were in high school. You will actu­ally have to study, unless you’re a genius, and your time-management skills will be chal­lenged. There will be a few bumps in the road, but that is just life in general.

As much work as it is, col­lege life is a blast and most adults will tell you they wish they were still young and in school again. You will have the oppor­tu­nity to meet so many new peo­ple and do new things that you may never have done before. You can join a club sports team or other stu­dent group and inter­act with other peo­ple your age who share your inter­ests. If Ferris does not have a sin­gle group that gar­ners your atten­tion, you can start your own group.

You can go to bed when­ever you want and eat what­ever you want. I am not advo­cat­ing stay­ing up until 3 a.m. and eat­ing pizza every day, but it’s your choice. No one is going to hold your hand and cod­dle you any­more. This is adult­hood and you are respon­si­ble for your own actions.

Life on the couch is a bor­ing one. Get out there and expe­ri­ence every­thing that Ferris State and Big Rapids have to offer. Expand your com­fort zone and you just may be sur­prised to find just how much there is to do around here. Go tub­ing down the Muskegon River or play a round of disk golf at Northend Riverside Park. I thought rac­quet­ball was a bor­ing game played by old peo­ple, but it is actu­ally fun and it is a great workout.

This expe­ri­ence will be what you make it to be. You won’t be in col­lege for­ever, so take advan­tage of every minute and soak it all in. It may seem like the years will drag by, but four years dis­ap­pears in the blink of an eye. Take each day as it comes and never pass up the oppor­tu­nity to make a mem­ory. n