10 Things You Might Experience After Graduating College

1. You will secretly hate that quasi-friend from high school who has miraculously become VP of some company two months after getting their diploma. They will post things on Facebook like, “just another day at the office” alongside a picture of a crate of kittens or lobster dinner. What kind of company has a mandatory cat cuddle corner or serves shell fish?! A FAKE COMPANY, THAT’S WHO. But you will Google it, and find out, yes, your friend does have an amazing job at a real company. AND YOU HATE IT.

2. You’ll realize you actually just hate yourself for hating the success of anyone else. But man, how much better does it feel to pretend the root of your unhappiness is the result of someone else? Jamie Foxx said to blame it on the alcohol, but I prefer blaming that girl with the perfect Instagram life. Filter this, bitch.

3. If you pull the ultimate post-grad cliche and move home, you will enter Puberty 2.0. Nobody understands you! Nobody even tries to! You will stay held up in your room for hours and hours on end. You might even melodramatically yell, “YOU’RE RUINING MY LIFE” a la Lindsay Lohan in Freaky Friday. You basically just revert back to a hormonal teenager, with the whiny, acoustic soundtrack to match.

4. You fall down the rabbit hole and end up spending hours looking at photos of yourself in high school. If only you had appreciated how adorable and youthful you once were! Now you’re starting to develop dark circles and bags under your eyes. You coulda been something! You coulda been a contender! But now you are just slowly becoming fat Marlon Brando in his later years. At least you can post one of those photos for the next #tbt and see how many people like you in your prime.

5. Cry. Like, a lot.

6. Create a goddamn BEAUTIFUL spreadsheet with daily goals. I’m talking meticulous spacing, fancy fonts, you already knooowwww. Tape it right next to your bed, with the idea that you can wake up and see it first thing. Something happens. The tape gives out. The earth moves. Life has other plans, and the piece of paper falls under your bed. And with it, so goes your motivation to stick to those daily goals.

7. If you are single, you’ll do a little recon on all of your exes. You’ll sleep better if they look worse.

8. Run into an acquaintance you haven’t seen in years and spiral into the worst, most awkward conversation ever, otherwise known as the, “what are you doing now?” WHAT AM I DOING? I’M HAVING WEIRD SMALL TALK WITH YOU, THAT’S WHAT I’M DOING! Oh, career wise? I’m letting my liberal arts degree keep me warm in bed at night.

9. You find that you’re starting to get more excited about new Netflix releases than the idea of going out and acquiring credit card debt from purchasing alcohol. Binging now refers to watching, not drinking. And to be honest, I’m still trying to figure out which one is healthier.

10. Realize that any transitional time period is going to be hard. You’re going to run the gamut with emotions. You might feel selfish for complaining about being 20 something and feeling lost. You might feel lonely in a room full of the people who used to make you feel like you belonged. You might stay awake reblogging cute apartment photos on Tumblr, envisioning a future that seems so far away right now. You’re going to feel a lot of things, and that’s okay. Nothing is right and nothing is wrong. You just graduated college, and yeah, this is the end of one chapter. And the beginning of this next chapter might be unclear, and scary as fuck, but keep writing. You’re gonna hit that sweet spot. Just keep writing.