Why Finals Don't Totally Suck

I could just be the one lucky girl who always has much more going on dead week than finals week but I found myself really enjoying my last day of classes and not dreading the weekend before finals and finals week. Here's a couple reasons why:

1. Closure. When you're done with a college class you're totally done. Done with that professor, done with that course, done with the people in your class and on a big college campus it's much easier to avoid people you don't want to see than it is in high school.

2. Throwing things away. I love getting rid of papers and notebooks and returning books. It goes along with closure and makes for a much less cluttered desk for studying for any final exams.

3. Redemption. Finals are your last chance to prove yourself - whether it's proving to your teacher that you can learn or proving it to yourself.

4. You know what you need to do. At this point in the year you know what your grade in the class is and you can calculate how much leeway you have to still get the grade you want.

5.  Freedom. Finals week no one has classes so everyone decides what portion of the day they want to devote to studying. This means you can coordinate with your friends to go to the library together and hang out at night because no more 8 am classes! You no longer have a schedule dictating your week which means you can take advantage of any last minute opportunities as well.

Relationships

Date someone who makes your problems seem smaller

            Your heart feel bigger

            Your mouth smile wider

Date someone who makes you want to be the best version of yourself

            Who inspires you

            Who’s willing to be adventurous and outrageous with you

Date someone who reminds you how lucky they are to have you in their life

            And lets you “steal” their t-shirts

            And isn’t afraid to tell you how they feel

Date someone who lets you be the little spoon no matter how badly they want to be

            Who holds you close when you’re sad

            Who doesn’t give up on you

Date someone who sings to you

            Laughs with you

            Dances with you

Date someone who makes plans for the future with you

            Who will go out of his/her way for you

            Who’s interested in your accomplishments and wants to see you succeed

Date someone who will make your life better because of the experiences you shared

            the memories you made 

            and the lessons learned. 

Date the person you can’t wait to talk to when you wake up and hate saying goodnight to. 

Packing Up, Moving On

As freshman year comes to a close, my roommate and I have begun to fill boxes with decorations, clothing, and remnants of our first year of college. It's a weird feeling because you spend so much time making your room feel like it's yours and forcing yourself to get comfortable and then before you know it its time to pack it all up and for those who haven't moved recently or ever, it's the first time you're packing up your life in a sense. When you come to college you obviously pack things from home but there is a lot of purchasing as well - new sheets, cleaning products, mattress pads, storage bins, the list goes on and on . Leaving college, however, is all packing - whether its to be stored in your college town or brought home it all has to leave in boxes. I recently started packing up my dorm and soon enough I'll be packing up my room at home too as we prepare to leave the house I've lived in the longest for somewhere new. What I like about packing is it's time to think about what's really important and what's worth keeping as you embark on a new journey. I always think about the scene in Sex and the City when Carrie and the girls have to pack up her closet so she can move to a new apartment with Big. They go through tons of outfits, recounting all with memories attached as they decide to trash it, give it away, or keep it. That's my favorite part of packing - uncovering memories you hid away in clothes you don't wear anymore, or things you shoved into the back of your closet and drawers. It's sad to leave but exciting to look towards what's in store; so take your time, don't be afraid to throw things away, but also don't forget to keep in mind the memories made along the way.

The Power of Music

As a former radio DJ and CD enthusiast, I' m a firm believer in the power of music. It can completely change your mood, bring back memories, or make you believe in something bigger. The right song can make you feel alive and invincible. The first time I went to South Carolina to visit my boyfriend was very music-heavy. At the bar he sang Sk8r Boi (Avril Lavigne) to me, we listened to country music in the car, sang and danced around his room to Unwritten (Natasha Bedingfield), and when he drove me back to the airport bright and early Sunday morning, my eyes watered as Talladega (Eric Church) came on. For the next month or so I couldn't listen to it without immediately feeling upset. This wasn't the first time music had triggered such strong emotions for me though. In 2012 I went on a trip to Eastern Europe and Israel with a group of 45 other teenagers. Throughout our time together we learned many song together. One was a Hebrew song, called Acheinu. We sang it at many of the concentration camps we visited during our memorial services. At Majdanek we stood in a large circle, next to the pit of ashes of those cremated while the camp was functioning. As we sang, our voices got louder with the second verse, but our eyes got more watery. When I got home from this trip I went to camp for a week, joined by three of the other girls from my group. During slow ruach at the end of Shabbat on Saturday night the entire camp got together on the basketball court and one of the songs we sang was Acheinu. I cried as I felt transported back to Poland. For the next three months every time it was sung I pictured myself back in Majdanek. It wasn't until December, when I was reunited with my group and we sang the song in high spirits, happy to be back together again, that the tears didn't come. As summer approaches, my spirits are high again, with the end of my freshman year of college in sight. With summer comes the infamous summer playlists. I started working on mine today so here's some of what's on it:

Kids In Love (album) - The Mowgli's - my favorite right now is You're Not Alone
Cheerleader - Felix Jaehn Remix - Omi (SO CATCHY, such a feel good song)
Old Thing Back (feat. Ja Rule and Ralph Tresvant) - Matoma, the Notorious B.I.G.
Homegrown - Zac Brown Band
See You Again (feat. Charlie Puck) - Wiz Khalifa
Uma Thurman - Fall Out Boy

Practice Makes Perfect

...or so they say. If it's true then the more I write, the better I'll be at it and the easier words will flow, right? I think this is true to an extent. In German every week we write a journal entry on what we read the past week, seeing as it's an Introduction to German Literature class. At first I used to struggle so much to meet the word count and find enough to write about for the given topic. Today I wrote my 12th journal entry and it's gotten to be a much faster process than it originally was and much easier also. Although I'm still not getting perfect grades because checking my German grammar is a lot more difficult than checking my English grammar, I think I have definitely improved. What I've taken from this experience is that the more I practice writing in this blog, the more I'll actually keep it up (hopefully), so today I thought I'd talk about projects.

For one of my classes, we've been doing a lot of work with branding - identifying our own brand and selling ourselves. Next week we have a personal brand poster due, and with it we need to link a social media site that promotes our brand. The problem with my Facebook and Instagram, however, is that I don't think they full capture my brand and who I am as well as they could. Instead of linking one of those, I opted to make a new site specifically for this project. I started working with Pathbrite. When you make a profile it suggests that you answer three of their questions as a little about me section. One of the questions was "When do I feel most energized?". I thought about it feeling pretty energized as I realized that the project for me was something that made me feel energized. I love working on new projects. I can't say the same about finishing them but more on that later. I recently came across a website to make my brand poster and it has a ton of graphic art text you can add to posters or pictures and make really cool business cards, invitations, blog posts, or whatever comes to mind. For example, I made this cool blog header I'm going to try and find a way to add on to my page:

Uncovering something new is like unlocking potential, like seeing a different side of someone or finally understanding a concept that was holding you back in a class. Opportunity inspires me. It gets me energized and excited. I like the idea of a blank page, an open day, something that you can fill the way you want to. I guess I've always liked projects. I was big on art projects in school and dorm decorations was a favorite activity of mine this summer. Even in school I liked getting a head start on projects because when you have time there's so much you can do with it. I mentioned before I'm not so good at finishing projects. I hate being in a time crunch or having one part left of a project after I've been working on it for a while - the only exception being puzzles, but even with those I get bored at the end when all the pieces begin to look the same. Does that make me a quitter or just a great starter? Is there a such thing as someone who starts projects and gets the ball rolling then passes it off to someone else to finish it so they can move on to the next thing? If there is why I haven't looked into it yet is a mistake on my part. The more I think about it the more true I realize it is. Even with books I get bored before the ending and struggle to finish, and with blog posts thinking of a way to end them is difficult so they usually end in the middle of some thoughts. I guess all I can say is it's a good thing I'm not playing a sport or trying to write a novel. 

To check out my Pathbrite go to: https://pathbrite.com/lngoldstein
To make cool graphics go to https://www.canva.com/

What I Learned in Boating School Is...

We grow up with the idea that failure is bad. As children and teenagers we are afraid to fail. We follow the expected path and do as we're told and live the life we always expected we would, because we're afraid to do something else, with the risk of a bad ending. But why?
Obama promotes change and Americans love it. We like to say change is good. But how are we supposed to really change, as individuals, or as a nation if we don't experience failure?
Today I may or may not have failed my first test. To be completely honest I did a lot of guessing and it could have worked out in my favor or I could have done horribly. Only time will tell. The weird thing is I'm in a great mood. I feel relieved. I walked outside of my test building interested in what the weather and what was going on around me and mostly excited to start working on something new. But let's go back to the test for a minute. I've had a bad attitude about this class since day 2. My mother, the CPA, didn't approve of how I was being taught accounting in school and because I trust her opinion, I didn't consider the class worthy of my time. I could not tell you what was being taught in class for the past 4 weeks, nor did I read the notes or really even follow along. Let's fast forward: it's 24 hours before the test and I'm freaking out that I'm unprepared. Little do I know how unprepared I really am, seeing as I learned pretty much nothing the past month and 24 hours is not enough time for a girl to learn 8 chapters of basic Financial Accounting. I studied as much as I could, skipped half of my classes and didn't pay attention to the classes I went to, learned a little, got to the test and did what I could. By no means did I feel confident about my answers but I felt confident that I did what I could and that was that.
Failure forces you to grow up. I'm a decently smart kid and a fast learner so I never really had a problem with studying before because I didn't need to do much of it to get grades I was happy with. Granted, I also usually pay attention in class. Then came the infamous second semester slump - it exists and it is very real. My motivation has been at an all time low and although I've been focused it's been on Netflix and extracurricular activities more than anything else and as a result, I bombed my Basic Accounting midterm. More than anything else it was a wake up call; a reminder that good grades and knowledge don't just come to you - they're things you have to work for. I thought I would come out of the exam room depressed about an awful grade and demotivated but I've never felt a stronger desire to get ahead again and start studying earlier - I want to change and I know what changes need to be made; something I would not have felt had I not failed. If I had managed to cram last minute and get by with a good feeling about a good grade nothing would have changed; the procrastinating would have continued and the hatred towards that class probably would have as well. It's ironic because I see the class as a weed-out; one to test whether or not students are really Kelley material. The funny part is I'm a candidate for direct admission into the Kelley Honors Program and a direct admit to the Kelley School. Now it's time to take my failure and change it around so I can prove to myself and Kelley that I deserve to be there. Point is, stop being afraid to fail, you never know what good will come of it.

Planning For the Future

"Make a plan of what you want and how you're gonna do it and do it". Sounds easy enough right? For my boyfriend it was. Until recently I didn't realize that where I am in my life right now is where he was in his life when we starting dating almost two months ago. A little lost, a little alone, unsure of my friends, my place in college and the world, and to be honest a little scared of what's to come. It's such an isolating feeling, not being sure of your friends and so far from your family - feeling like there's no one close who really gets you. It wasn't until I talked to a friend that I realized she was in the exact same position as I was. Maybe it's the long distance relationship or realizing everyone in college tends to fit one of a couple different profiles, maybe it was overhearing too many ridiculous sorority girl conversations when you really just question who you're going to school with, but whatever it was, I realized I wasn't alone. Finally after this I was able to actually tell my boyfriend about it and explain it to him better and I was surprised to find that he knew exactly as I felt. For him he was mid sophomore year, not super involved on campus and not really happy with where his life was going. He decided to become an ambassador for the school, waking up at ungodly hours Monday mornings to share his campus with visitors and did I mention he's incredible at it from what I hear? He also decided to finally invest himself in a fraternity. Hopefully tomorrow, after over 8 weeks of pledging and not enough sleep, he'll be able to call himself a brother. He decided he was going to go after me, and he did. He won me over and there's maybe two hours of the day I'm awake that I'm not talking to him. The last thing he knew he wanted was to do better. He's focused on his grades and studies hard and sought out internships and is challenging himself and I couldn't be more proud of all he's accomplished. It's one thing to meet someone who does incredible things and has incredible drive but it's another thing to see it in action. He's inspired me to do the same, and the first step is deciding what I want, and my first decision was that it was about time I made a list of goals.

The first is to see the Israeli Business Group gain national recognition by TAMID, the Israeli Investment Group, and become an outstanding  Kelley club. We've built it from the ground up and I want to see it succeed and grow to the potential I know it has. 

The second is to start making connections within Kelley; to talk to professors, students, recruiters, and to give myself a presence within the school worth remembering and something to be sad about leaving behind. 

The third is to not stress myself out over my grades. My academics have been important to me for as long as I can remember and I've always held myself to such high standards but now that I'm in Kelley and Honors it's about learning not about getting an A on every test and assignment. I still want to do well but I want to have a life too. 

The last is to find inspiration and share it. To update this blog or write articles or do something with fashion or read more - find things I enjoy and have more of them in my life. 

Also to make and maintain super cool friends of course.

And now that they're in writing on the internet there's no taking them back so wish me luck. 

Writing about Writing

I love the reading and I love the idea of being a writer. I loved Dan in Gossip Girl and Lucas in One Tree Hill and how they had such a way with words - they could make people feel things, hurt people, save people. and change people. I, on the other hand, have a blog no one knows about because I don't think I write about anything worth reading. I always admire people who write articles for Her Campus or Hello Giggles or run a successful blog but I've always struggled to find the inspiration to write a novel or a short story or even a continuous blog. My posts usually end up being rants or late night thoughts if I'm really inspired enough to start writing.
The problem is starting. Once I think about something and start typing the words flow, whether or not they're good and it's not a problem, but I could sit and stare at my computer screen for an hour not knowing what to write.
Writing is like a guilty pleasure that I also kind of hate - mostly because I read other things and am in awe and jealous that I'm not as good with words. I think it would be awesome one day to write a blog like Carrie Bradshaw in Sex and the City, or publish a novel, and I feel like I should've had enough experience by now to be able to write one, but how does a pretty average, basic, white girl from a generic American suburb find something incredible to write about?
I'd like to believe I'm not as average as I appear. I always try to be more interesting - to have more to me and be complex and wildly inspirational - the kind of person people meet and say "she's going places" the problem is I have no idea where I'm going. I liked radio for a while, I still love music and editing sound but I don't see a career in it. I love my business classes but I also feel like there's always so much to know. I like reading and editing but being an English major doesn't sound appealing. So what am I left with? For now business, I just hope that I can be more than an average business person - that I can do something to change how people think or help people grow. I think that's really what I want to do - leave an impact.

Fitting In vs. Being True to Yourself

When you go to a Big Ten school many things are considered normal; getting up at 4:00 AM to start drinking, wearing your sorority or fraternity letters to the gym and just about everywhere else you go, working hard and partying harder, being proud of your athletes, etc.  I came to IU thinking these were all things I wanted to be a part of.
What I've learned since coming to college is that these things are not for everyone. Being required to be at a sorority house whenever you're told and having social obligations of going out every weekend at least once or twice, if not more, are not obligations I want to have. I realized being in a sorority is not for me. The thing that bothers me is how people in sororities don't realize that. I went to Florida over Spring Break and was at the pool, wearing a B-Town shirt, when a girl wearing her sorority letters comes up to me to ask if I go to IU. I tell her yes and among her first three questions is "Are you in a sorority?". Obviously I said no and the conversation ended with her inviting me to come party with her during Little 500. Many times if you tell a sorority girl you are not in one, they will give you an answer along the lines of "oh, I'm sorry to hear that". The possibility that you decided to drop, or even not rush at all - that you did not want to be in one, is rarely considered. There's a sense of entitlement gained from being in a sorority - that because they were selected to be given a bid based on looks, personality, whatever it is, they are better than you, when in reality, they could just have completely different interests and priorities than you.  Non-Greeks are called GDI's for a reason - we are God Damn proud to be Independent.
The only disappointing part of being a GDI at a school such as IU, is that if you live in Northwest, social lives revolve around Greek life. This past weekend was Quals - a weekend for the Greeks to start drinking at 4 AM Saturday morning and keep it going until 4 AM Sunday, as if they really needed an excuse. Many of the other dorms and clubs at IU will have their own Little 5 bike teams, take for example, the Teter residence and the IU Nursing Club. Foster, McNutt and Briscoe, however, have probably never had their own Little 5 team, which means, if you live in any of these 3 buildings and are not in Greek life, Quals probably just means a quiet Saturday for you, which for me at least, makes you feel bad that you have no team to cheer on and no where to be. But that would mean not being true to yourself if Greek life is not for you. It's hard to sit back and watch the people you know having a great time being drunk all day and celebrating "Qualidays", but is there any solace is knowing you're not lying to yourself, trying to be someone you're not? What if you don't really know who you are or what you're not?
I saw myself being a sorority girl, going to tailgates and Little 5, wearing letters, throwing "what you know" up in the air at the beach over breaks, going to frats, and when I got here and as time progresses I realized that was never going to be me, but if I know that's not who I am why is it so hard to accept that's never who I'll be?
Probably because although it's not me, I'm still surrounded by it. My friends are in sororities, there's at least one person in each of my classes in a sorority if I had to guess, and my roommate is in one so when big-little week came it looked like a sorority threw up all over my room. What not going Greek taught me was that it was time to find myself and find where I did belong.