Honors College Art & Science of Emotions Fall 2017 (12:00 p.m.) Sadness Journal | Page 25

School Time
Sadness
Rachel Vargas
Many people like to associate college with pleasant things. Children use it as something
to look forward to, with it having easy classes and giving them plentiful freedom. Adults use it
as something to reminisce on, with it having a ton of parties and giving them the foundations
they needed to become successful in life. However, the way that all students look at college
while they’re actually in it is much different than how their previous and future selves have and
will. The students do still enjoy the easy classes that are occasionally thrown their ways, the
partying, and the newfound freedom, of course. However, there’s so much more to college than
just those good things. The tests, the overwhelming new sense of responsibility, the thought
that any sort of failure will bring a person’s life goals to a halt: these are all things that college
students must deal with that aren’t discussed with children and adults try and push aside in
their memories. College does bring a lot of good feelings, but good feelings can’t exist without
the bad ones, thus sadness is also present.
College itself is a trigger for sadness for some, but as a college student myself, I think
that the main reason university life isn’t all so pleasant is that society puts way too much of an
emphasis on the importance of succeeding in college. People always say that one has to do well
in college to be able to work at a good job and live comfortably. However, they always ignore
just how stressful college can be when they say this. By saying this, they’re also saying that a
person must do well on every test, that they must get all of their homework done all the time,
that they must never skip a single class, etc. It’s no wonder students are some of the saddest
people in the world. According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, 85% of
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