11 things I wish I knew after I graduated
By: Myla Roberts
Tags: Postgraduate, Pgsg, Post Grad Life, Lessons Learned, Graduation

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

It’s been 3 years since I graduated and I thought I would share a few things that I have learnt in the hopes that it helps someone, anyone, feel heard, reassured, and encouraged.

I know I felt slightly overwhelmed at times in my first few years post-graduation, and I was always comforted when hearing in conversation with my close friends that they were dealing with similar concerns or situations.

So, I hope the following tips feel relatable to someone, and the advice helpful, as these are some things I wish I knew after I graduated; ranging from the practical, to the mildly philosophical.

1. It’s ok to fail and get things wrong.

This is always easier said than done. And don’t get me wrong, by no means have I mastered this. But I’ve found this to be a useful phrase to come back to. It has made it much easier to try something new, put myself out there, or go for that stretch role/project.

Know that it doesn’t matter if you mess things up as long as you are heading in the right direction. And of course, the surefire way to fail at something is to not try at all.

Whenever I remember to, I quiz myself on what I’ve failed on in the last week, and/or month. It makes me reflect in a way that doesn’t make me feel guilty or ashamed about my failures, but instead allows me to recognise I can learn from them going forwards (or that maybe I needed to fail a few more times to get it right). It’s an exercise I would recommend.

Finally, it’s always worth considering what the worst thing is that could happen, then reflect on whether you could figure a way out of it. 99.9% of time I bet you probably could.

Useful resources: How To Fail With Elizabeth Day

2. Be ready to start learning — a lot — about yourself

Once out of the structured confines of school and university, you are suddenly confronted with the vast, unstructured real world. One where you aren’t measured and tested every year on discrete topics with defined increments of improvement, providing you with evidence of your strengths and weaknesses, things that you’ve learnt, and an anchor point for your identity. “I’m doing well at PE and sports” therefore, I am someone who is sporty. “I’m doing well at maths and science” therefore, I’m good with numbers and I’ll continue to study these topics. I’m being brazen but just to make a point.

Starting with learning and development: as it becomes less evidenced, structured and often lacks a clearly defined end goal (the school equivalent being a GCSE grade), I found it useful to just recognise that this was something that had changed and consider what actions I could take to regain an element of it. Setting measurable, time-bound goals was great. As was keeping a log about what my strengths and weaknesses were each year. This proved to be something that I could come back to to recognise my development.

Secondly, identity: feedback helps, as does trying out a myriad of different activities, approaches or routines. This helps with finding what we’re most comfortable with.

3. Resting helps you recharge, and definitely isn’t wasted time

In an age where you can always find someone on social media who is doing something bigger or better than you, it’s important to know that you can rest and reset. Spend a weekend binging a Netflix series you’ve already seen, or watching YouTube videos about how to propagate your favourite succulent. This can help you recharge, or it can simply be for the pleasure of it.

Two quotes I like on this topic:

“No time spent is wasted” — from a yoga teacher I once had.

“Technically everything’s a waste of time” — from another yoga teacher I’ve had (amusingly opposed to the previous quote, but with the same sense).

4. Make the decision to view and enjoy content a conscious one

This technically isn’t unique to the post-graduate experience, but it’s something that’s come to more of a head in the past few years and is a topic that’s very relatable to most people in our generation.

It’s only too easy to waste a morning getting sucked down an endless social media/YouTube/article rabbit hole. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing inherently wrong with this, it can be a great way to relax and unwind. But when it leaves you feeling worse off, with zero to little benefit, or with not enough time to actually complete the things you wanted to do that day, then its probably worth trying to avoid those situations again.

My tips to do this? Turn off the notifications to apps that you know you get sucked into. Delete the app, or move it to a hard-to-get-to location on your home screen. Use the timers that apps have to alert you if you’ve spent longer that what you feel is reasonable on it. Or give yourself a reminder of how you felt the last time you spent too long in the same situation.

5. To-do lists 🙌

Technically this isn’t something that I first learnt to do after graduating… but to-do lists are great. (warning: I’m weirdly into to-do lists). The reason why I’m including to-do lists in this is because I’m still learning how best to use them in my life. They help me keep on top of my various responsibilities whilst maintaining boundaries between different areas (work and home etc.), and because I think I would be incapable of offering advice without mentioning to-do lists.

The best thing I’ve learnt in the last 3 years? Have a separate list for each area of your life, but one daily to-do list where you pull in items from your other to-do lists. This can help create separation between different tasks, but also help you have daily focus on tasks from a range of areas (preventing balls from being dropped).

What qualifies areas to be a separate list? Everyone’s different, find what works for you. They can be different projects, at work and home; for different people (e.g. I’ve got a couple one for me and my boyfriend, and a personal one for admin tasks that just impact me); the time it takes to do tasks (it can be great to gather tasks that just take 10mins, to install that sense of achievement, but also have a repository of meatier tasks that you can sink your teeth into when you are in the mood); and combinations of the above. The way I’ve segmented mine has changed over time and I expect yours might have/will to.

To prevent this from becoming an article solely about to-do lists (I warned you I had a concerning obsession with them), I shall move on after providing this one final recommendation. Everyone has different preferences when it comes to making notes or lists digitally or on paper; I love using apps. My favourite of which is Microsoft’s To Do app, which I would thoroughly recommend.

6. Know you can try out as many different things as you want

Looking back, I wish I hadn’t put as much pressure on myself to find and commit to things that I thought I should be doing. Instead, I would want myself to recognise that there’s pleasure and learnings that can be gained from trying different things. I know and am comfortable in the fact that habits I have today won’t be with me for ever, just for as long as they serve me.

7. You can be multidimensional, most people are

Not everyone has a singular passion that can be their one purpose or work. You can have multiple. Working in different areas can help bring different perspectives. You can have a job that you find interesting, but also want to spend time caring for animals or contributing to climate activism. These can be fulfilled by volunteering opportunities or side projects. Your job doesn’t need to completely define your purpose.

8. Know you’re not alone

Graduating and starting work and the world of adulthood is exciting, anxiety-inducing, thrilling, overwhelming, fun, manic, and all at the same time — I guess everyone lives their own version of it. Mine was exacerbated by self-imposed pressure to do something worthwhile that would give me a fulfilling career.

Talk to friends and family about how your feeling and they’ll either be able to support or relate. Either way, it can feel cathartic and relieve some of the pressure.

9. This is it; you are you

Your accomplishments don’t give you an identity. They don’t change you. It’s great to have ambition and drive. But don’t expect accomplishments to make you feel more secure or more worthy. The way you view yourself and react to your circumstances is down to your mindset, and this can be changed or worked on no mater what you have, or haven’t, accomplished.

To this point, there are plenty of stories of highly accomplished, seemingly successful people, that ultimately turn out to be suffering with depression and suicidal thoughts because of their mindset. In each of these stories I’ve seen a common thread, that they were chasing achievements to give themselves identity or meaning, and after they either did or didn’t achieve their goal — nothing changed, they were still left with themselves, and what one world record holding cyclist described as feeling “a hole inside [himself]”.

So go after what you truly want to accomplish in your lifetime; not because you think achieving it will prove a point to either yourself or someone else but because it’s how you want to spend your time.

10. Be in touch with your intuition

In a world full of manipulative adverts, fake news, and polarising opinions, it’s important to feel a connection with your intuition. What you intuitively think, want and find interesting. It’s important to make your own opinions, this includes knowing that you don’t know something, otherwise someone else will make them for you.

11. And now my final piece of advice: don’t take advice.

Have the confidence and self conviction to figure things out for yourself.

Now I see that this is at odds with the rest of this article. However, if you are to take one thing from this, it’s this point. Don’t worry about everything I’ve written here, about following it or using it. Feel free to figure things out for yourself. Remembering that, no one really knows what they are doing!

I’d love to hear if you found any of this useful or if you have any other tips in the comments!