'Sage' Advice- High school is not so cool



Posted: Thursday, July 28, 2011

by Casey Starkweather

When I was a wee fourteen year old, granted not that long ago now, I was given some of the worse, misguided information possible. The most common piece of bile was that high school, that dreaded building of hallways and torture, would be the best years of my life. If those three years of torture (here's a piece of advice: graduate early) were the best years of my life, I hate to see the worst. Quite frankly, the best years in life don't come until you are in your mid-twenties and thirties.  I have not even reached the best years of my life yet. But I do know something: life gets better after high school. College is better, in most cases, because everyone is in the same boat. In high school, it's about what you wear, who you talk to, what you did on Friday night (or rather, who you did); college is often quite different, depending on where you go, of course. Life becomes about what your major is, who your teachers are, what classes you are taking, and what you did on Saturday night.

High school is not as amazing as they say. You are not 'free' to do as you please; in fact, you still have to listen to your parents and teachers. Teenagers can be mean and heartless, making you feel low to inflate their own ego. You'll get talked into doing things that you are morally against: stand your ground. Drugs, drinking, sex..yeah, it's cool, but not for your body. When you reach legal age and want to drink, go for it. Until then your mind is still developing. Drinking and drugs can cause serious harm. Maybe 'everyone' does it, but hey, that doesn't mean that everyone does it.  I didn't do drugs when I was fourteen, nor do I now. I didn't have sex when I was fourteen, nor should you. At fourteen your body is not mature enough for sex. It's still developing, some teens don't even start to develop until they are fifteen or sixteen.  High school is a stepping stone to life, but that doesn't make it great or amazing.

High school is far from the best time of your life. In fact, the people who tell you it is have successfully blocked all of their memories of high school from their minds. Wait until you get to college to really start living, that way, at least, you can enjoy it a little bit more and you are ready to handle life.
Casey is an 22 year old college graduate, majoring in History, Minoring in German. She plans to go to Law School, or if that fails, to get her Ph.D. She writes articles based on personal experience, in the hopes that someone will learn from her mistakes and with the hope that she can change someone elses life.

Advice to a 14-Year-Old
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)
» left by Ella Camp
 299 days 19 hours ago.
90 fans.
High School is a good example of things in life that are supposed to be great, but in reality often are not. I think one piece of advice I would give to kids is: Don't go into life over-expecting from it- you'll be disappointed a lot. It is what it is, and we have to learn to either change it, if we can, or learn to deal with what is. Really good article Casey- Thanks- Always-Ella
» left by Christofer French
 299 days 15 hours ago.
74 fans.
Casey: Great bit of advice for your group of people. I think your input is exactly what kids need. Good writing and welcome to SW. Yours, Chris
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