A week before I joined Lovely Professional University as a freshman, I had the “What to expect from college” talk with my cousin who had already graduated. One of the most prominent things I remember being told was that your teachers are hardly going to care what you are dealing with in life and all they would want would be you to finish your assignments within the prescribed deadlines.
And I knew no better, though a part of me was hoping it to be wrong because it wouldn’t hurt to have someone guide you along the way. Well, the journey has sure has been a roller coaster ride, but among the many other things from my experience in LPU, her words about my professors have been incorrect. And here’s a little, but a most noteworthy snippet from my experiences as to why.
Midway in college, I went through a really rough patch and lost a hell lot of confidence about myself – basically had an existential crisis. Feeling utterly chaotic and searching for my lost self I somehow found myself in front of Ms. Divya’s cabin. I had a hell lot of apprehensions before opening up to her, some of them were like “How I would be taken, would I be laughed at?”, “Would she understand?”, “Can she help me?”, “What if all this was a big mistake?” But they were all for naught as she not only warmly welcomed and listened to everything I had to say without judgments but also said one sentence that would forever keep me going no matter how hard the circumstances. It was to my question, “I don’t know how to find my lost self anymore?” and she looked me in the eye and gently told me “You are never going back to who you were before because you are now going to become a better version of yourself”.
It wasn’t instantly life-changing, but yeah, it kept me going and a large part of my confidence and happiness today is because I had that one professor who was willing to help me through the mess. Apart from her I also met many wonderful faculty who not only helped me with academics but also in co-curricular activities such as how to ace leadership skills in UNYC (United Nation Youth Community) or what could have made my speech better and more.
So if there was one thing I would give a piece of advice to my former self is that she could be unconcerned about the teachers she would be under as after all LPU’s professors would indeed be more than just educators
