The One Benefit of Quarantine

    Something that I’ve been thinking quite a bit about this week was the topic of “peak experiences”. When I was trying to think about my different peak experiences I was looking for a specific date or moment that I could put my finger on as MY peak experience. Well, that was stupid. One, not everyone has just one peak experience, and two, it doesn’t have to be a specific moment where self-actualization happens. For me, my most recent peak experience happened towards the beginning of quarantine. 

Everything I knew was changed and thrown in every direction possible. I am a person who is very resistant to change and I like to have constants in my life. As you can tell, COVID was definitely not one of those constants, and took all of my constants and threw them out of the window. All of the consistency that was in my life disappeared, and as a result I was given the perfect opportunities to really reflect on my life in general. Now that I had the time, whether I liked it or not, all I seemed to be able to do was self reflect and criticize my own life. Since everything was changing, I was able to see how flawed my “routine” was even though I had become so dependent on its consistency. My future was also a huge aspect that I took a lot of time to think about, and especially since college application season was right around the corner. 

This was my point of being in a “peak experience”--- for the first time I took a step back

on my life and thought about myself from an outside perspective rather than my own narrow view. I realized that the “high school” mindset that I had been in for the past three years was so pointless and toxic. While it may sound cliche, I really followed the old piece of advice that in high school, issues in the moment would seem like the end of the world, but in the grand scheme of things literally nothing I did in high school mattered. Now while I am still in high school, I am making the conscious decision to use the past tense as mentally I am pretty much past high school, except academically I am still mostly present. While I still relish that this is my high school time, being physically removed and not able to partake in anything school related besides academics or clubs, I feel like I’ve moved on.  

I realized that I didn’t want to be the kid who peaked in high school then went to a state

school or joined a sorority and stayed in state or kept my same old friend group. I do love my friends with my whole heart, but I really love the idea of starting anew in a fun city where my opportunities are endless. I know that I would thrive in a place that allows me to explore the diversities of the world and wouldn’t trap me in this same high school mindset.

Over quarantine I have been able to figure out my true passions, get a deep understanding of what I value in close friends, and I got a really strong grip on my morals and opinions about this crazy world. I’m sure for anyone who has read some of my earlier blog posts, those opinions are pretty explicit.