Community Constantly Changes
It is okay to focus on your now versus your future.
Hello everyone and welcome to (or welcome back to) my blog—Myla’s Muse!
Recently, I was sitting in my professor’s office with about five other students. One who is also a junior and the others were graduating seniors.
What seemed to be out of the blue, the other junior asked what the space was going to look like once everyone graduated this spring. The room chuckled and the conversation moved on but since that happened, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.
Throughout my time at Howard University, my community has constantly changed. It looks different from year to year, semester to semester and sometimes even week to week and day to day.
This experience isn’t new to me. My community has changed from elementary to middle to high school. Even from my graduating class of almost 800 students, I only regularly talk to two people who walked the stage by my side.
I came into Howard thinking that my experience would be different, but as I am getting closer and closer to my degree, I am so glad that it’s not.
There were many times that I thought changes in the community around me were going to be for the worst, but when I really think about it, there isn’t a time when things haven’t gotten better.
There are some people who I met during my first week on campus that I thought would be my forever friends, but not even a month into the semester, we stopped exchanging words.
Coming to college, people warn you that the friends you make during that first week probably won’t be the friends you graduate with, but what they don’t warn you is that there is no guarantee that any of the friends you make will be the ones that you graduate with.
I’m here to say that this is completely okay and sometimes for the best.
When I look back at my relationships at Howard that have ebbed and flowed, I am so appreciative for the time that I have had with each individual, but I am also so appreciative of the time that we have had apart.
In life, we focus too much on the future.
Too many people live to work, or live for the weekend, or even live to work for only the possibility of retiring. Well, personally, I’m tired of living for the future.
I want to pour into myself right now, today, in this very minute. I love it when people talk about how money will always come back but time won’t.
Yes, maybe I am not fully employed at the moment, but there is no doubt in my mind that I will not make back the $20 that I decided to spend on Chipotle. There is no doubt in my mind that I won’t one day make back the $100 that I spent to go to a concert that I didn’t even know if I would enjoy.
On the flip side, I will never get back the 30 minutes I spent enjoying eating my Chipotle bowl while watching YouTube. I’ll never get back the 40 minutes I waited in line, where I admired everyone’s outfits, nor the three hours that I spent in the venue, where I had an absolute blast.
Yeah, maybe I could have used that time to write an essay or submit an application or maybe even sleep instead, but I created long-lasting memories that I value, similarly to how I value my community.
Some of my best friends that I met through my freshman year, I still talk to them regularly, but we don’t hang out every day. I hang out with people from different organizations, from different schools and different communities. I constantly expand by circle because you never know who you’ll meet and what kind of impact they will have on you.
In previous posts, I have talked about how life waits for no one and the same goes for time—it waits for no one.
Life Waits for No One and Neither Do I
Hello everyone and welcome to (or welcome back to) my blog—Myla’s Muse!
On a similar note, my community cannot wait for anyone. There are so many people who I have accepted into my life because I thought they would be good for me long term, but the real question is: are they good for me right now?
There are so many people that I have almost turned away in my life because I thought they wouldn’t be good for me in the future, but they were what I needed in that moment and there is nothing wrong with bringing them in for that moment.
I think back to my time in the office, where one of my peers asked what our lives will look like without these graduating seniors.
I’m on track to graduate in one more semester, so I don’t know what it’ll look like in the spring, but in the fall, I imagine we will still fill the room.
There will be new faces and new laughs, but at the same time we have already built the foundation of a community in this space where students can come relax, debrief and sometimes even gossip.
Sometimes, community doesn’t always mean the individuals who occupy the same space. Sometimes, the community is just the space in the moment at that specific time of day.
As I continue to matriculate through Howard and as I navigate new positions, opportunities and experiences, I’m focusing on what is good for me in this moment. We cannot guarantee anything past this moment.
Success starts now; it doesn’t start later. So, as I continue to navigate my last classes of my undergraduate degree and move forward with pursuing other journalism opportunities and continuing my higher education, I just remind myself that it’s okay to live for now.
I remind myself that it is okay to make a decision because that’s what I want to do right now in the moment. Maybe Myla in two to three years will look back and question my decisions, but all that matters is that I’m happy now.
Life waits for no one and it doesn’t speed up for anyone. It just exists and if I’m just going to exist, then I’m going to exist in a community that sees me, that hears me and reminds me that we truly are a true community.
As always, I appreciate you tuning in to my happenings on Myla’s Muse. Please be sure to like, comment and subscribe so you can stay up to date on everything that I have in store. You can also follow me on Instagram @mediabymyla to follow all of my journalistic endeavors!
This was so on point. I’m glad your mom and I are still friends 35 years later. 🫶🏽 Proud of you!
Wise words Sugar!