Moral: Never trust a graduating senior's advice. Chances are it's biased, blatantly untrue, or just really bad advice to begin with.
Senior Fall. Means it's time for me to get on my podium and proselytize: "Hear ye! Hear ye, Underclassmen! For my remaining time here at Dartmouth I shall consistently try one of two things:
- To seduce you.
- To misinform you.
And sometimes, both.
The art of giving bad advice is a transgression we seniors with all our newfound wisdomosity have committed since the chicken first laid the egg or the egg first hatched the chicken or whatever the hell it was that actually came first. And I'm afraid it all stems from a simple truth: Older people love to give advice.
Problem is, we love it a little too much.
We're not entirely to blame, though, as the vicious cycle of giving bad advice starts at a young age. First, there's your parents' bad advice. "Now remember what I taught you to tell the bullies, Sarah, Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.'" And then there's your teachers and coaches. "Cheating never gets you anywhere in life except detention." Or, "No pain, no gain. So let's move it, Frostenson." But perhaps the worst of all is when we actually begin listening to the advice of our peers. "Dude, it was like the easiest class ever. I literally didn't learn a thing. You should totally take it." Or, "If you don't get into XYZ sorority, you should just drop out of rush and wait to try again in the winter. A lot of girls do that."
At Dartmouth we are constantly bombarded with advice. From an institutional level the SA course guide, UGAs, PALs, DOSCs, Career Services to a very personal level our parents, our friends, our teammates, our frat bros and sorority sisters. And not all of it's good. Furthermore, a lot of the advice tossed around doesn't encourage us to think for ourselves. Because why challenge ourselves to do something different when there's a track we can follow that's been proven to succeed?
This isn't to say that there is no such thing as good advice. Looking back on freshman year for instance, I wish someone would have told me it was OK to drop a class. That it was OK to quit, that I didn't have to stay enrolled on principle. Or that it was OK to ask for help. That it didn't mean I was weak or a failure. By the same token however, there's also a lot of advice I wish I hadn't listened to freshman year. "Join as many clubs and extracurricular activities as you can. It'll help you discover what you want to do at Dartmouth." But what they don't tell you, is you also end up wasting a lot of time on things that don't matter to you. You sacrifice valuable time that could have been spent discovering new interests or hidden talents you never knew you even possessed.
Don't get me wrong advice has its time and its place. But chances are, it should also have a restricted word length. And depending on the setting, it might need to undergo a sobriety test as well. Regardless, do not place too much stock in advice. What works for others might not work for you. And that's okay. Blaze your own trail and keep in mind when listening to advice that those who dispense the most advice are usually the ones who followed their own advice the least.
Which is why I've decided to go ahead and apologize in advance for all the bad advice I'm going to dispense over the next year. Consider yourself forewarned. At times, I will be nostalgic. "Cherish Sophomore Summer. It was the end of my youth." Other times, regretful. "Don't be like me. Focus early on your academics." But most of the time, I will be just flat out wrong. "Don't stress about senior year. It'll all work out in the end?" Which is why you should take everything I say with a grain of salt. Except touching the fire. Any '14 reading this, that you should actually do. Don't be the worst class ever.
