One of my biggest personal lessons in my whole packing-my-life-up-and-moving-across-the-world-for-university journey, was learning that the friends you make in your first year aren’t guaranteed to be the ones who’ll stick by you the entire time you’re in school.
However what I learned in second year is that you can meet amazing people at any time, and to not feel discouraged if you don’t instantly find that group of people you mesh with and feel entirely comfortable and 100% yourself around.
Finding those people who genuinely have your best interest at heart, and those you can return the feeling towards, it can't be rushed. Some people may seem to mesh instantly, but whether it's a friendship or a relationship, you have to take time to learn more about one another.
It's within this learning period that both red flags, and green flags tend to pop up, and you can determine if any red flags are just too much for you.
If you’re not comfortable in a situation, your gut tends to become quite 'vocal.' - Listen to it.
Don’t be like me and stick around in a situation just because you’re afraid of loosing your 'friends' or if you share that feeling of being afraid of being lonely.
It's okay to feel this way, but don't let it be a driving force that keeps you in a miserable situation.
It can be draining on your mental health for one, in extreme cases it can get in the way of school, and other aspects of your life, and just at the end of the day, you shouldn't have to feel drained around anyone you're willingly spending time with.
Time, but also your time, it's precious!
If you need to take a step back and analyze the relationships and friendships you’ve built, do that.
An unfortunate reality in this life, is that people come and people go.
Nothing lasts forever, and I personally find that the university/college/post-secondary scene is a little different than primary or secondary school, because you’re pushing more into that adult life where for a lot of people, school isn’t the only concern in their life anymore.
You begin to have different experiences bringing both good times and some tough lessons - this is just part of growing up, and applies to everyone around you.
University/college is a place where there are people coming from so many different backgrounds, having experiences that may be similar, or entirely opposite to what you may have experienced and/or have come about in your life.
There are so many people to learn things from, so many people you can teach things to, the possibilities are almost endless.
Ask yourself if the people you’re letting into your life, if they're helping you grow, if they're helping you develop.
Are they enhancing your university, or post-secondary education experience in a positive manner? And vice versa?
Do you 'jump' at the idea of spending time with them? Do you respect one another's boundaries?
If you're finding yourself answering no to any of these questions ... also don’t be like me and just drop off the face of the earth and avoid everything and everyone. (I don’t do confrontation well.)
If you feel like a situation warrants an explanation, where you feel like you need to pull back, you can provide one.
If not, then whenever you’re ready to step back out and start anew, do you boo.
The whole post-secondary environment is one where not only you, but others around you are learning and growing, some people are coming into their own while others are just experiencing for the first time what it's like to have complete independence.
However this is a time to really assess if your energy is positively aligning with those you're surrounding yourself with, whether it be one person or multiple.
This doesn't mean everyone is happy like pappy 24/7 (a phrase from back home the older folks love to use) - rather you can communicate when you're in both a good, or a bad mood for example.
I remember feeling so helpless at the end of my first-year because to me, some of the ‘friendships’ I found myself in, never felt like friendships.
I was constantly drained, I felt undervalued, taken advantage of. I enjoyed my personal space and peace even more than usual, and I never fully felt comfortable enough to express myself entirely around them.
I was driven by my fear of being alone, and feeling as though if I didn't make friends in my first year, that was it for me. So I stuck it out even though it became less and less enjoyable as time passed.
However once everyone's true colours came to light, and one last uncomfortable situation hit me harder than the rest, I decided to remove myself entirely.
So you can imagine how I felt coming back up in my second year, feeling like I didn’t have that core group of friends compared to people who seemed to have meshed instantly during orientation week and create strong, supportive bonds - which I was also lowkey jealous of. (Comparison is the thief of joy y'all, I'm still learning this years later.)
Returning to Canada in 2018 (after I'd gone home for the summer following my first York Strike experience) was even more uncomfortable for me that arriving in Canada for the very first time just a year earlier in 2017.
I had no real support system in Canada as yet, so I tried to push myself into joining some clubs and organizations on campus - something I didn’t do AT ALL in my first year.
I was starting fresh.
Fresh mindset, open to new experiences - I was really trying to go with the “what do I have to lose” mentality, like what I talked about in my Making the most of your Post-Secondary Experience (Becoming more active in campus/student life) post here.
I tried to find myself in everything under the sun the first week or two when I came back up for my second year. I was impatient and just wanted to make friends.
It sounds so bad to admit out loud, but this genuinely just how I felt at a point in time. As an international student who came up here with no friends, it's not that I don't enjoy my own company, just I was going through this whole change of living in Toronto on my own for the first time, and times just got lonely.
It stung even more knowing that there were people I went to high school with that were also going to school in Toronto at the same time as me, but I was the only person going to York and therefore didn't have anyone with me that I knew from back home.
For a while, it felt like all I had was the four walls of my dorm since they were the only thing I really saw outside of my classes.
The fact that I was going to a school where no one knew me however, pushed me even more to get involved. The idea of introducing myself to people who knew nothing about me was equal parts exciting, and downright terrifying.
Getting involved on campus was a real push out of my comfort zone because I've always been an extremely shy and introverted person, and often struggle to put myself out there, meet new people and make new friends.
I briefly enjoyed the thrill of packing up my scheduling, joining thing after thing, but I still didn't feel like I was really meeting people.
Then one day, I took a minute to really look at all the things I was trying to invest my time in, and that’s when I had to take a step back.
Realistically you can’t be in everything. I had to reassess what caught my attention the most and what I felt was contributing to my post-secondary experience in a proper way.
I took my time, found out more about the Caribbean club on campus, and stuck with it.
Still initially driven by my want to make friends, as time progressed I also found new aspects of being part of a club that caught my attention as well, and by truly sitting with it and putting my all into it, I'd say it brought me many positive, and sometimes unexpected returns.
Above all, after joining the Caribbean club, I can now say that I’ve met so many people who not only 'make up' for my first poor attempt at making friends, but these are people I feel comfortable around, people I can relate to, people who have seen me laugh, cry, get angry, get excited, people who above all, support me, and vice versa.
Every experience is a learning one, whether it works out the way you wanted it to, or it doesn't.
My advice here, though easier said than done, is that if things don't work out the way you wanted them to, mainly in relationships and friendships, don’t be discouraged for too long.
First-year Maya would not have wanted to hear this, but sometimes we don't always want to hear what we need to hear.
The term 'friend' gets thrown around quite loosely sometimes, so first and foremost you need to asses what you would define as a friend, what qualities you're looking for in someone you'd be proud to call a friend.
In addition to this, there’s so much happening around us all the time, that sometimes it just boils down to you to make that first step to get things rolling, and I promise you, there’s going to be some kind of reward for your efforts.
It may not be instant, but it will come overtime, all you need to be is patient, be yourself, and the right people will come your way and love you for your authentic self.
Whether it’s one friend or a whole group, or just a new space to feel comfortable in to meet new people, you’ll find it.
Don’t be discouraged if it doesn’t happen in your first year! Or even your second! Or any year of post-secondary education, even after you've graduated. I still had friendships fall apart all through my 4 years of university, it didn't just start and stop in first year, but I also met people all throughout my time at university, even beyond gradating.
Just put yourself out there, find something interesting to join, or create a space yourself, and the rest will fall into place.
As an introvert, like an extremeeeee introvert I know those words are again, easier said than done, but remember, there's no time limit, no clock counting down on putting yourself out there. There's no schedule that says this is the best time to make that first step.
It also becomes relatively easier the more often you do it.
As I mentioned, I went in with the mentality in first year that if I make no friends now I won’t make any or have anyone there for me for the rest of my university life, because that kind of support, to me is something I really value.
I've learned, and I'm still learning that if you want something, at the end of the day, you can’t always just sit around and wait for it to come to you.
You have to push yourself a bit too, and this applies to almost anything in life; school, work, down to relationships and friendships.
It’s been such a wholesome experience to have made friends who are both local and international. Some from Trinidad and Tobago, or have a Trinbago background, some from the Caribbean region, others from halfway across the world, and there’s so much I've learned, and I'm still learning from all of them. (I've also made some contributions too, no one-way roads accepted here.)
So to reiterate again, for the thousandth time, don’t feel discouraged if you didn’t meet your ✨BFF4L✨ during orientation, or your first year, or within anytime during your post-secondary experience.
First year may seem like prime time you *need* to find friends, but just remember nothing good ever came out of anything rushed. The best ones will come along.
There’s so many places to meet new people outside of class and orientation week.
I’ll promote this for the rest of my life - Join at least one club! Or start your own!
Meet some people with similar interests!
Because of pushing myself out of my comfort zone, I was able to befriend people who I see as my Canadian-home-away-from-home family now, and I never imagined it would’ve happened as quickly as it did.
In fact I never even imagined it ever happening at a point in time - but these people have actually made such a large impact on my life in such a short period of time.
So to all the new people I’ve met and befriended by putting myself out there and pushing myself, who’ve helped me in more ways than one, and more than you’ll ever know (you know yourselves), If I don’t say if often enough, I just want to quickly express, and remind you all just how much you all mean to me, and how grateful I am for all your support.
It means the world to me and so much more and I love you all so much. ♥️
(And I need to get some more photos with a lot of you :( )
- Maya 💛