Candice Swanepoel 💖
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Advice/FYI’s to High School Seniors
My main pieces of advice for all those students starting their senior year of high school this fall. Of course, these won’t all apply to everyone, but take what you want from it. Here’s some advice from someone who just graduated.
- By the time you get to senior year you either have 3 close friends. or you’ll be friends with everyone. Either way, cherish them all.
- Do not slack off. If you do, at least wait until the second semester.
- Take easy classes. Unless you don’t mind lower grades in hard classes due to senioritis then I suggest you keep your senior schedule pretty simple.
- Take off periods. You will LOVE them. You will be surprised with how much longer your days feel.
- Definitely start driving to school, or carpooling with someone who does.
- Go to the football games. Even if your team sucks. They’re just good experiences.
- Actually, go to as many school events as possible. Senior year was my first time going to volleyball games, or the dance shows. This is your last chance to experience them.
- You do not need to go off campus for lunch everyday. You do not want to earn your freshmen fifteen as a senior.
- Your senior year group of friends will be the group of friends that you wish you’d had all throughout high school.
- You will meet new people, and become friends and wish that you met them sooner. Because some of them will be juniors and you probably won’t see them for a very long time.
- Start applying to colleges as early as you can. Preferably once you start senior year, or the summer before.
- If you haven’t already taken your SAT/ACT you definitely need to get started on that your first semester.
- Go to prom if you can. It won’t be the BEST night of your life, but it’s a good one.
- Start thinking about what you want to major in. This is definitely subject to change, but you’re going to want to know a couple options once you start applying to colleges.
- Once you do accept your offer for a college, and it becomes definite, high school becomes so much harder to get through because you just want to leave.
- You’re going to be waiting for graduation THE WHOLE YEAR.
- If you’re in a relationship and are going your separate ways after graduating now would be a good time to either end it, or figure out ways to be long distance.
- Long distance very rarely works.
- At prom, it is a very good idea to invest in some comfortable shoes.
- Take lots of pictures.
- Go on college visits to as many colleges as you can.
- Save your absences for the last weeks of school because that’s when you are REALLY not going to want to go.
- Be one good terms with some of your teachers, because you’re going to want letters of recommendation.
- If you want to take pictures with your friends after graduation, be ready to pick a place to meet up beforehand because it will be very hard to find them afterwards.
- Do your homework. Please.
- Stop talking to the people that you realize you’re only nice to because you have classes with them.
- Now is just not a good time to develop a crush.
- AP tests are suddenly very hard to study for considering that you’ve been taking it easy all year.
- Your SAT score does not define you and getting a bad one is not the end of the world.
- However, do as well as you can because colleges often give assured scholarships to students who meet certain SAT/ACT scores.
- Your GPA is either going to drop, or raise A LOT.
- GPA doesn’t really matter at this point though. Junior year grades matter the most.
- Spend a lot of time with your family. You’ll be off to college before you know it.
- High school parties are honestly overhyped.
- Now would be a good time to acquire a taste for coffee.
- If you oversleep, I honestly recommend just staying home that day unless you have a test.
- T-shirts will become your clothing of choice.
- If you love makeup, like me, by the last 2 months of school you just won’t have the energy to wake up 20 minutes earlier to apply it. So learn to be okay with how you look without makeup.
- Please eat breakfast.
- No one cares if you eat in the cafeteria.
- The freshman look SO tiny and it makes you wonder if you looked that small 3 years ago.
- Go to all the pep rallies.
- Have fun during spirit week. Some colleges don’t have them, so take advantage of it now.
- It is totally okay to not have a date for prom.
- One of the happiest moments you will have all year is being able to walk across the stage. Also, one of the shortest.
- Despite what everyone says, there is a very good chance that you WON’T cry at graduation.
- The senior year teachers are always the best.
- Be nice to the freshman.
- Be nice to any underclassmen actually.
- But also, take pride in being a senior. This is your last year. Own it.
my masterlist of ‘how to life’ tips
Cleaning & Tidying
- Make your bed in the morning. It takes seconds, and it’s worth it.
- Reset to zero each morning.
- Use the UFYH 20/10 system for clearing your shit.
- Get a reed diffuser and stick it on your windowsill.
- Have a ‘drop-zone’ box where you dump anything and everything. At the beginning/end of the day, clear it out and put that shit away.
- Roll your clothes, don’t fold them - or fold them vertically.
- Automate your chores. Have a cleaning schedule and assign 15mins daily to do whatever cleaning tasks are set for that day. Set a timer and do it - once the timer is up, finish the task you’re on and leave it for the day.
- Fold your clothes straight out of the tumble dryer (if you use one), whilst they’re still warm. This minimises creases and eliminates the need for ironing.
- Clean your footwear regularly and you’ll feel like a champ.
Organisation & Productivity
- Learn from Eisenhower’s Importance/Urgency matrix.
- Try out the two-minute rule and the Pomodoro technique.
- Use. A. Planner. (Or Google Calendar, if that’s more your thing.)
- Try bullet journalling.
- Keep a notebook/journal/commonplace book to dump your brain contents in on the regular.
- Set morning alarms at two-minute intervals rather than five, and stick your alarm on the other side of the room. It’s brutal, but it works.
- Set three main goals each day, with one of them being your #1 priority. Don’t overload your to-do list or you’ll hit overload paralysis and procrastinate.
- If you’re in a slump, however, don’t be afraid to put things like “shower” on your to do list - that may be a big enough goal in itself, and that’s okay.
- Have a physical inbox - a tray, a folder, whatever. If you get a piece of paper, stick it in there and sort through it at the end of the week.
- Consider utilising the GTD System, or a variation of it.
- Try timeboxing.
- Have a morning routine, and guard that quiet time ferociously.
- Save interesting-looking shit to instapaper. Have a set time where you read through the stuff you saved to instapaper and save the shit that you like from instapaper to evernote (or bookmark it properly).
- During your working hours, put on your footwear, even if you’re sat on your bed. (Why?)
- Have a folder for all your important documents and letters, organised by topic (e.g. medical, bank, university, work, identification). At the front of this folder, have a sheet of paper with all the key information written on it, such as your GP’s details, your passport details, driving licence details, bank account number, insurance number(s), and so on.
- Try using StayFocusd and RescueTime (or similar apps/extensions). (I promise, you’ll find that you’re not as busy as you think you are.)
- Schedule working time and down time alike, in the balance that works for you.
Money
- Have. A. God. Damn. Budget.
- Use a money tracker like toshl, mint, or splitwise. Enter all expenses asap! (You will forget, otherwise.)
- Have a ‘money date’ each week, where you sort through your finances from the past seven days and then add it to a spreadsheet. This will help you identify your spending patterns and whether your budget is actually working or not.
- Pack your own frickin’ lunch like a grown-up and stop buying so many takeaway coffees. Keep snacks in your bag.
- Go to your bank and take out £100 in £1 coins (or w/e your currency is). That shit will come in useful for all kinds of things and you’ll never be short on change for the bus or the laundry.
Food & Cooking
- Know how to cook the basics: a starch, a protein, a vegetable, and a sauce.
- Simple, one-pot meals (“a grain, a green, and a bean”) are a godsend.
- Dried porcini mushrooms make a fantastic stock to cook with.
- Batch cook and freeze. Make your own ‘microwave meals’.
- Buy dried goods to save money - rice and beans are a pittance. (Remember to soak dried beans first, though!)
- Consider Meatless Mondays; it’s healthier, cheaper, and more environmentally friendly.
- Learn which fruits and vegetables are cheapest at your store, and build a standard weekly menu around those. (Also remember that frozen vegetables are cheap and healthy.)
- Learn seasoning combinations. Different seasoning, even with the exact same ingredients, can make a dish seem completely new.
- Don’t buy shit for a one-off recipe, especially if you won’t use it all. If you really want to try out a recipe, see if a friend would be interested in making it with you, then pool for the expenses.
- Make your own goddamned pasta sauce. Jamie Oliver has a decent recipe here, but the beauty of tomato sauce is that you can totally wing it and adapt the fuck out of it.
Misc
- Have a stock email-writing format.
- Want to start running, but find it boring? Try Zombies, Run!.
- Keep a goddamn first aid kit and learn how to use it.
- Know your OTC pain relief.
- Update your CV regularly.
- Keep a selection of stamps and standard envelopes for unexpected posting needs. (It happens more regularly than you would think!)
Some final words of advice:
- Organisation is not a goal in itself, it is a tool. Don’t get caught up in the illusion of productivity and get distracted from the actual task at hand.
- Routines and habits will help you. Trust in them.
- You have the potential to be an organised and productive person, just as much as anybody else. It just takes practice.
this is truly excellent 🙌🏻