By the virtue of the fact that you have been admitted to one of the most elite universities in the nation, you've likely scored astronomically on your standardized tests and reaped numerous distinctions and accolades. Now, you've stepped onto a more level playing field. Students at Dartmouth have started their own companies, published their research in Nature magazine, authored New York Times bestsellers and have won a vast spectrum of national and international competitions many of them before their freshman year even started.
In this competitive milieu, most of you will face disappointments in your academics and extracurricular activities; not all of you can earn As or become president of a campus organization. You will test your scholarly mettle with other valedictorians and salutatorians from private prep schools and magnet public schools. You will compete with other former student body presidents and socially capable students for grants, jobs, internships and leadership positions. Many of you will fall short of the high standards that you've set for yourselves throughout the entirety of your high school careers.
But that's okay.
At Dartmouth, surrounded by thousands of other intelligent students, your foibles and limitations will come to light. In the best case scenario, finding your weaknesses will push you toward introspection, honest assessment of your own abilities and your goals, as well as how you evaluate your own sense of self-worth. And by better knowing your goals and limitations, you will become more equipped to tackle future challenges that you will face beyond Dartmouth.
I learned this the hard way. Throughout much of high school, I operated under the logic that achievement was necessary for happiness. I won awards and leadership positions, published research and opinion articles, gained acceptances to Ivy League institutions and graduated as the valedictorian. When I found my accomplishments failed to bring a lasting sense of fulfillment and happiness, I set new goals, but for the wrong reasons.
It was only after I arrived at Dartmouth that I could not fulfill my academic and extracurricular goals as easily as I had done before. Faced with this impasse, I had two options: continuing to beat myself up and try harder, or reevaluating my priorities and goals and trying harder. After an emotionally draining freshman year of adhering to the first option, I made the switch over to option number two. I gave up positions and opportunities to channel my energy into the projects most important to me. As a result, I gained a better understanding of my limits and where I want to end up and am now emotionally and physically healthier than I was before.
I will admit that I still encounter setbacks. And despite the externally happy campus culture of Dartmouth, many of my peers have also assured me that they still struggle to deal with the emotional growing pains of challenges and disappointments.
But by encountering setbacks at Dartmouth, you have the opportunity to look back to see who you were in the past and reassess who you want to be in the future. In many cases, the College will challenge you and push you beyond your current limitations to emerge as a person who is willing and able to take on the world.
People often set goals for themselves in expectation of how life will be different once that goal is achieved when the SAT is done, when this course is done, when school is done, when college is done, and ad naseum. But then at the end of every challenge, too soon, the next challenge emerges to replace the one you've completed. At Dartmouth, you will have no shortage of challenges and by extension, disappointments. But rather than shying away, you should embrace each hurdle and disappointment as a chance for inner growth. Your current trials and missteps will prepare you for future ones, and by taking on and overcoming disappointments and hardships earlier in the game, you will better be able to take on future challenges that the world throws your way.
